


myeongok (a dream-song) 1: London, 2013/14

by forochel



Series: chun/myeon/gok [1]
Category: Day6 (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Crushes, Gen, London, M/M, Modern Royalty, Prequel, Slow Burn, Unresolved Romantic Tension, loosely inspired by The King: Eternal Monarch
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-26
Updated: 2020-09-05
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:55:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 31,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24921901
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forochel/pseuds/forochel
Summary: from bysine'schunmyeongok:Younghyun spoke of London very little but always with an odd look on his face, like he was holding back a lot of feelings.'this is year one of the london years. selected scenes.(can be read as a stand-alone, but why would you?)
Relationships: Kang Younghyun | Young K & Yoon Dowoon, Kang Younghyun | Young K/Kim Wonpil, Kim Wonpil & Park Jinyoung (GOT7)
Series: chun/myeon/gok [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1936813
Comments: 95
Kudos: 87





	1. Settling In: The Kang Younghyun Free Education Package

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bysine](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bysine/gifts).
  * Inspired by [chunmyeongok (a dream-song of spring)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24597997) by [bysine](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bysine/pseuds/bysine). 



> fic of fic. fully written, and will be posted in chapters as I copy-edit them.
> 
> takes massive liberties on all fronts: with the tkem premise (alt history constitutional monarchy corea, That Edict, and then sproings joyfully away from the drama); with london of the early 2010s (there is a limit to how much I will gmap, the SWs being v much NOT my stomping grounds); with ucl (it has been A While); with the lives of the rich & privileged (there is a limit to how much I want to know).
> 
> this is feelsy self-indulgence crammed to the brim with jokes that have ricocheted between bysine and me for so long i don't know if they'll make sense beyond our 2 person echo chamber.
> 
> if you're willing to look past all that, thank you. I hope you enjoy.

_'Younghyun spoke of London very little but always with an odd look on his face, like he was holding back a lot of feelings.'_

* * *

Younghyun had been to England only once before, when he had been sixteen and Dowoon — His Majesty — fourteen. He didn't remember much other than the frantic, hushed high tension of the trip, and shadowing Dowoon everywhere. Dowoon had still been so frail and sad, then, the grief still very apparent in his young eyes.

So when (Acting) Captain Song had said, "Kang, do you want a free education?"

And he'd said, "Pardon me, sir?"

And Captain Song had elaborated, "Do you want to go to England with His Majesty?"

And Younghyun had finally realised what this was all about. Then he'd just said, thinking about the fact that his mother had always been worried about his education after he'd joined the family business (i.e. Royal Guard-ing), "That would be a very good opportunity, sir."

"Oh, I'm glad you said so" — Captain Song made a mark on his clipboard — "because you didn't really have a choice about it anyway."

*

He worked out, later, that the decision had been made because he was about the same age as His Majesty, and that His Majesty was used to him. And that Younghyun got to call His Majesty 'Dowoon' away from the public eye, though it had been impressed upon him at a very young age that he must never do so beyond the King's Quarters.

(He worked out again, whilst working on his dissertation, that they'd essentially been grooming him to _really_ take after the family business, i.e. captaining the Royal Guard.)

*

Navigating Fresher's Fair was a bit of a nightmare, security-wise. But Younghyun supposed that if Dowoon wanted the whole undergraduate experience, then — well — considering what the rest of his life was going to be like, why oughtn't they go the extra mile?

After the fifth booth that they'd stopped in at — after Muggle Quidditch (Dowoon had solemnly hopped around straddling a broomstick for a solid minute while Younghyun looked on and wondered about the Dignity of Corean Royalty and whether he ought to intervene); the Cheesegraters (not actually a club for kitchen accessories); Recreational Football (as in Park Ji-sung); and the Anime Society (no elaboration required) — Younghyun suggested that they take a break from the crowds and go find food.

Dowoon looked relieved and nodded, gesturing for Younghyun to lead the way.

As _if_.

Gently taking His Majesty by the arm, Younghyun nudged him in the direction of the closest exit to the Cloisters, and made sure to follow closely behind.

There were a few other agents from the embassy in the crowd — it had been _ridiculously_ , _unnervingly_ easy to slip them in — as well as some members of the Guard who had come over to England with them. Younghyun spotted Sergeant Jung, an old hand who'd flattened his teenaged ass on the mats over and over until Younghyun finally managed to stay on his feet for more than five minutes, at five o'clock.

They were almost home free when Dowoon halted and turned, eyes wide and imploring, to point at a booth staffed by a tall, scruffy ginger and a short, curly-haired girl who was loosely holding a trumpet in one hand. Stretched along the table was a banner that said UCLU JAZZ SOCIETY.

"Hyung," said Dowoon quietly, "can we..."

Helplessly, Younghyun flicked a glance to Corporal Yang — eleven o'clock, looking idly over a brochure at the Horticultural Society — and said, "Yeah, sure, Y — Dowoon-ah."

Dowoon gave him an amused look, shook his head slightly, and then they ducked around a few people engaged in a passionate debate about ... Younghyun didn't even know, there were as many accents in Britain as Corea and his ears hadn't got used to all of them yet.

There was a scattering of flyers spread across the table — jam sessions, practice times, audition slots, the next few showcases, past showcases, a paper sign-up sheet — and a giant clunky laptop that was playing some sort of concert recording on loop. _Night and Day_ issued tinnily from the speakers plugged into the computer.

"A fresher! _Two_ freshers!" said Ginger Guy in a friendly way. "What do you play, then?"

"Um." Dowoon's back straightened like he'd just been confronted with a microphone and camera. "I'm sorry — I don't really ... I just like jazz."

"Oh, that's all right," said Trumpet Girl, elbowing Ginger in the side. "Don't mind Rob, he can't help having been born without any tact. Here, we've got open jam sessions" — she handed Dowoon a flyer, and since Younghyun was there she gave him one too — "that anyone's welcome to come and listen to. It's Jazz Appreciation too."

Rob, looking a little sorry, said, "And we're always happy to give little lessons and things."

"H — " Younghyun swallowed the automatic honorific. "Dowoon knows _some_ drums."

Dowoon gave him a betrayed look.

"Oh, cool! There you go, then, mate. No need to be shy."

"Just a bit," Dowoon demurred. "Never really had the ... the time."

Younghyun bit his lip. Because ... that was a very good lie, in that it was true. His Majesty hadn't really had the time to pursue any interests of his own, what with school and all his royal obligations.

"Well, you might now," said Trumpet Girl briskly, and then pointed at the name tag stuck to her chest. "I'm Aoife, by the way. Nice to meet you, ah — Dowoon?"

"Yes," said His Majesty, who barely managed to stop himself from holding a hand out. "That's right."

"Cool." Aoife glanced up at Younghyun, who was currently fielding a chorus of voices in his ear telling them to go and get lunch because everyone was getting peckish. "And tall, quiet, and mysterious is...?"

The voices in his ear went abruptly silent. "Younghyun," he said and pointed at the clipboard. "Sorry. Is that where we sign up for the mailing list?"

"Oh, right, yeah." Rob pulled it over and shoved it at them. "Here, just your name and email's fine."

Dowoon shifted his weight and Younghyun edged in, withdrawing a pen from his pocket. Switching to Corean, he said, "You want me to sign you up personally too?"

"I know how to write, hyung," said Dowoon. "And I'm pretty sure that paper isn't poisoned."

"No stone unturned," said Younghyun, and scribbled the _.ac.uk_ ending to his uni email with a flourish.

Sighing, Dowoon took the pen (discreetly embossed with the _mugunghwa_ ) and filled out another row with his name (Yoon _Dowoon_ , doyoon13@ucl.ac.uk).

Whilst he was bent over the clipboard, a pair of other freshers — astonishingly short, distinctly East Asian-looking girls — bobbed up to the booth to watch the video that had looped over on the laptop. Aoife nodded a hasty goodbye and went over to talk to them.

"Are you guys friends from home?" asked Rob interestedly. "That's Corean, isn't it? Had a mate in halls first year from, where was it, somewhere rural, she said. Could introduce you guys!"

Oh for — Younghyun usually liked people who were this friendly and helpful, but not when he was supposed to be keeping His Majesty incognito and out of close contact with anyone who might, on the off-chance, recognise him. He was about to interject, when Dowoon blinked rapidly, before smiling Public Engagement Smile #3: Appeasing the Natives. "Ye-Yeah, we've been friends for a long time."

"That's nice, that you have someone here with you," said Rob.

"It is." Younghyun nudged Dowoon in the back and smiled apologetically at the very nice Jazz Soc people. "Sorry, thank you very much for your time, but we're meeting people for lunch, so..."

"Oh!" Rob exclaimed. "Yeah, no worries. See you at a session, yeah?"

"Yeah," agreed Dowoon in the sort of shy mumble that would send his elocution tutors past into fits, and let Younghyun herd him away, out into the less crowded cloisters and thence to food.

*

"Why," despaired Lieutenant Choi, "couldn't you have just studied the same thing?"

The entire security staff — the members of the Guard, the embassy agents — had gathered before a whiteboard covered in sticky notes gridded out onto a roughed out weekly schedule.

Younghyun said, "Well ... I thought perhaps this might be more practical. My parents agreed."

There was a general deflation (amongst the Guard, anyway) at the revelation that their recently retired Captain had wanted his son to take up Economics.

Feeling sorry, he said, "I mean, at least I have to learn a language too ... and look —" He got up and went over to the board. "Our lectures don't overlap very much at all. And we already know it's ridiculously easy to just ... get into places."

After a long meeting that had required a break for tea and _tteokbokki_ courtesy of the embassy kitchens, they finally managed to work it out so that Younghyun would manage to shadow His Majesty to most of his lectures and seminars. And as for the tutorials —

The wrench in their plans came when His Majesty put his royal foot down about the tutorials. They had managed to finagle Younghyun into one of them — he had the freedom of an elective even his first term — but for the others, well.

"We haven't had this much excitement in so long," said Agent Shim from the embassy. "Not since His Majesty's Great-Uncle moved here. And now the old man just takes the fucking train up to London whenever he pleases and turns up like a —" He swallowed whatever he was about to say next at Lieutenant Choi's reproving glare. "— a ... person who turns up."

"It will keep things interesting, at least," Sergeant Ok said. And grinned when everyone in the room groaned at her tempting of fate.

Interesting, of course, meant they had to sweep the tutorial room every time before His Majesty had one, bugging the shit out of it before the very first time, and vetting all of His Majesty's tutorial mates back about six generations. Not to mention the TA.

Of course, the vagaries of university facilities allocation meant that on at least one occasion there was a last minute room switch, and a mad scramble to stay ahead of the students and do another sweep.

"Someone please just hack into their system," Younghyun pled with no little exhaustion, after one of the worst tutorials of his short academic life thus far. Dowoon had looked up from his seat — he'd at least saved the one next to him for Younghyun — and visibly reined in a laugh.

To be fair, Younghyun had — on about five hours of sleep and off a seminar and a 2 hour lecture — run from one of the massive lecture halls in the Psychology building to the old, run-down buildings opposite the vastly swankier Science ones along narrow Malet Place, then had to continue running through the main cluster of university buildings to the Cruciform. Where he then had to try and track down one of the many little rooms in the labyrinthine depths of the basement.

Everyone else had it much better, of course, and had fun choosing which courses to go undercover in.

This meant that Dowoon had the joy of trying very hard not to look too long at the various mature students who'd decided their calling in life really was Modern Languages and Linguistics.

In week 2 of term, for example: Younghyun had dropped him off outside his Beginner's Arabic tutorial and hurried off to one of his mysterious Economics things. There were, Dowoon knew, at least three other members of his detail hanging about in the corridor and quite possibly the ceiling, but he'd thought himself alone until someone sloped in through the door in an astonishingly dowdy jumper and sat down around the corner from Dowoon.

When it came to introductions, Dowoon got through it with the script he'd been given and smiled a little awkwardly around the table.

And then —

"I'm a mature student," said Sergeant Yoon in his lilting English, as though it weren't profoundly obvious. "In my previous job, I was a paramedic."

Dowoon, in the privacy of his brain, shrieked: SERGEANT YOON, YOU _ARE_ A _FIELD_ MEDIC!! YOU SET ONE OF YOUNGHYUN-HYUNG'S BROKEN BONES WHEN HE WAS SIXTEEN!

After the first few weeks of being confronted with the depressingly realistic identities that his guards, undercover, had taken on, Dowoon felt mostly resigned.

"Aren't you glad we're competent, Dowoonie?" Younghyun asked one evening, when they'd been left alone at home and were eating the last of the jjigae that Younghyun had made on Sunday.

Dowoon, feeling most ungracious and grumpy about having had someone who knew him bear witness to his fumbling attempts at the Arabic _Gh_ sound, said, "If I must," and bit vengefully into a mushy slice of courgette.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> massive thanks as always to bysine for the bellowing, for WRITING THE (BIRTHDAY) FIC THAT INSPIRED THIS MADNESS in the first place, and just being the ultimate writing buddy.


	2. Meeting Cousin Wonpil

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Enter the chaos twink twosome.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this does contain a bit of POV switching in between sections just because ... I'm having fun with this and felt like it.

His Royal Highness Prince Buyeong, also known as Dowoon's Great-Uncle, also known as the scourge of the security team of the Corean Embassy in London, popped up for a visit exactly a week after Fresher's Week.

"His Royal Highness does it again," said Agent Shim at the emergency meeting that had been gathered on Friday afternoon, right after Younghyun's Basic Principles of Microeconomics seminar.

Younghyun'd had to extricate himself from a conversation about the Fresher's Night at some club that sounded terribly unappealing and meet Sergeant Yang, eyebrow raised at his flustered state but also thankfully bearing veal paninis from the superlative hole-in-the-wall next to the Caffe Nero on TCR.

Ignoring his commentary, Lt. Choi said to Younghyun, "You're here, Kang, because His Highness telephoned ahead to request dinner with, and I quote, his grand-nephew. So it'll be a family affair, nothing official. Dinner prepared by the embassy kitchens, to be had in the usual rooms that His Highness makes use of."

"Oh, he usually stays here?"

"That is my understanding. This is the ambassador's residence, of course, but I'm given to understand that His Highness has not wished to particularly inconvenience the embassy's security by lodging in a hotel."

"Ah," said Younghyun.

"His Majesty's situation," said Lt. Choi, "of course, is rather different. Being long-term, for one thing."

Younghyun _had_ been wondering — on their last visit to London as teenagers, he distinctly remembered not having stayed in the embassy, but a very much grander old mansion somewhere off the Mall.

"I see." Younghyun nodded at the schedule sketched out on the ubiquitous whiteboard. "So dinner's at seven tomorrow. That's late, isn't it?" In Younghyun's experience (i.e. his own grandparents), old people usually ate early and went to bed early.

"Prince Buyeong has an earlier engagement," said Agent Shim. "Tea at Claridges. With his grandchildren."

Oh, right, Younghyun had read about Dowoon's second cousins in the information packet.

"Will they be at the dinner?"

"Oh, no." Lt. Choi shook his head. "They were not included in the request."

"All right." Younghyun uncapped a marker and drew in a box above '1900-2200 DINNER: P-H, D-G. "I know you said it'll be casual, but is there a dress code? Do — _Pyeha_ has some sort of language forum thing starting approximately 1600 hours on campus. It was in my update yesterday evening," he added defensively.

"As long as he doesn't turn up hungover in a ratty jumper and ripped jeans," said Agent Na with the faraway look of someone having a reminiscence, "I think you'll both be fine."

"Who — " Younghyun shook his head. "Okay, never mind. Problem with the venue — they just changed it — it's ... a cafe."

Everyone groaned, and then the afternoon was entirely lost to planning, contingency planning, and then some more contingency planning.

*

The only saving grace of the whole cafe situation was that this was the one with the best coffee on campus and, because it was also more expensive, less busy than the others.

Younghyun stationed himself at a small table behind His Majesty's chair, and kept one eye on Dowoon, another eye on his laptop, fuelled by the dark roast they had on drip. Sergeants Jung and Ok were on duty too, and had decided to pretend to be a mature couple on a date. The Royal Guards who'd come over to London on this long-term assignment were having far too much fun coming up with different covers, Younghyun thought. _He_ was stuck with his not-cover.

The afternoon passed peacefully, with only one minor incident when someone made a sudden move near Dowoon and Younghyun had almost knocked his mug over when he'd jerked reflexively. Across the way, the sergeants were absolutely laughing at him.

And then the students were gathering up their things in an explosion of chatter and scraping chairs. Dowoon sheepishly declined an invitation to curry at the place up past Euston Station and ducked his head when the Greek girl who'd been his second conversation partner teased him about having a date.

This, of course, led to an entire chorus of _ooooooooh_ s from what Younghyun felt had to be about a quarter of the entire fresher population of the Linguistics Department.

"No, no," protested Dowoon, the shells of his ears going pink in a way that Younghyun had been sure had been trained out of him by those comportment tutors. Would wonders never cease. "I'm not — it's dinner with a relative."

"I want to make a kissing cousins joke," said the tow-headed boy who'd been practising Japanese with Dowoon before all this wrapped up. "But it's taking me a while to workshop one. I'll let you know on Monday, mate."

Younghyun wondered what Prince Buyeong might say to being called his great-nephew's date. Or a _kissing cousin_.

"Please don't," said Dowoon, pained.

"Oh, leave Dowoon alone." The convenor of this particular language exchange forum, a lofty third year who'd spent most of it madly doing translating exercises of some sort at the end of the long train of tables the group had pushed together. "Come on, you lot, let's get out of here before they kick us out."

*

"Why am I so nervous?" wondered Dowoon, as they proceeded down the corridor to Prince Buyeong's suite of rooms. "Hyung, I'm so nervous."

"I'm always nervous before Chuseok family reunions," Younghyun said as comfortingly as he could. "All those elderly relatives and being terrified of calling them the wrong thing. At least you know what to call Buyeong- _daegun_."

"I suppose," said Dowoon doubtfully, and then they were at the double doors that announced the Phoenix Rising Under the Moon Suite.

"Poetic," muttered Younghyun under his breath, and knocked on the doors thrice before pushing them open and standing to the side.

Dowoon took a deep breath and let it out, closing his eyes briefly, and walked in.

The doors opened into a comfortably sized room lit by warm, yellow lamps hanging from the ceiling, and would have very good light in the daytime; two Georgian fan windows opened to the east. There was an eclectic scattering of furniture about the room — a spindly-legged reading desk here, and a squashy ottoman there. A Chesterfield with a finely woven silk throw bearing a tiger running through a bamboo forest carelessly pooled over one arm.

The room was also very empty, except for two embassy agents whom Younghyun recognised from Lt. Choi's weekly meetings. Agent Shim winked at him and gestured at the set of doors, set slightly ajar, next to the fireplace.

"His Highness doesn't stand on much ceremony," said Agent Na. "Go on in."

So they did, and — well, Younghyun had been very small when Dowoon's grandfather had abdicated and passed on soon after, but this sprightly old gentleman with kind, crinkly eyes and a face carved with laugh lines bore a great resemblance to his brother. Except for the head full of unruly grey curls.

" _Pyeha_ ," he said solemnly, rising from his seat. Only a little twitching at the corner of his mouth and the web of lines wrinkling deeper at the corners of his eyes betrayed him. "Do you remember me?"

But of course — Prince Buyeong had been given special dispensation to attend his brother's funeral, and much too soon after that, his nephew's.

"I think so," Dowoon said uncertainly, sounding very young. " _Chakeun harabeoji_."

"Aigoo," cooed Prince Buyeong, and strode over. "You were very young and very sad, it's all right, Dowoon-ah."

And then he bundled Dowoon into a hug and about a hundred different ways in which Dowoon could be assassinated at this moment flashed through Younghyun's mind as he started forward.

"Ah, and this must be your guard, eh?" Prince Buyeong said, letting Dowoon — looking very startled but pinkly pleased — go. "You look like your father. What's your name?"

Slightly abashed, Younghyun came up by Dowoon and bowed a little. "Kang Younghyun, _daegun-mama_. It's an honour."

"Oh, drop the — _mama_ , please." Prince Buyeong waved a hand and turned to go back to the table. "It makes me feel like I'm in one of those overwrought KBS period dramas. Not the kind I like."

"What ... kind of period dramas do you like, _chakeun harabeoji_?" Dowoon asked, sitting in the chair that was clearly his.

The table had already been laid with food — dozens and dozens of side dishes nestled in black-glazed pottery that glistened in the yellow light, a claypot of rice in the centre together with its twin, which turned out to contain doenjang jjigae that smelt very, very familiar.

"Regency ones. I do love an Austen adaptation," said Prince Buyeong in English, before switching back to Corean. "Now this, I understand, is one of your particular favourites? Lady Noh sent ahead several recipes, at the behest of Palace Cook. And we always have several pots of doenjang from the nuns of _Jinkwansa_." He looked at them with his twinkling eyes and laughed. "Oh, go on, just dive in."

Dowoon, who was famished from hours of language practice, and Younghyun — who was always famished — did.

Eventually Dowoon surfaced to make conversation with his great-uncle: answering the usual gamut of questions about his course of study, how he was finding London, so on and so forth — and then, to Younghyun's alarm, what _Younghyun_ was up to as well.

Frantically swallowing the exquisite tofu-stuffed pumpkin he had been savouring, Younghyun said, "Economics, _daegun-m — daegun-nim_ , and ... and performing my duties. My guard duties."

"Oh," said Prince Buyeong, who had been picking away at the food much more slowly than the two of them. He'd claimed to still be full from high tea. "Haven't you joined any — what did that boy call them — _social clubs_ , and the like? I'm given to understand that's the thing to do at university, you know."

Dowoon, who'd taken the opportunity of Younghyun's own interrogation to snarfle all of the marinated mushrooms, blinked significantly at Younghyun.

"We did — we did manage to have His Majesty attend Fresher's Fair," reported Younghyun. "Where we signed up for the Jazz Society. And there's all the department events, too..." he trailed off at the dissatisfied look on Prince Buyeong's face.

"I won't tell anyone if you address Dowoon as you normally would in private."

"Um," said Younghyun, and glanced at Dowoon.

Dowoon swallowed his mushroom with haste. "Oh good, hyung, you can be comfortable then."

"Very good." Prince Buyeong nodded imperiously. "Now, what's this about jazz? You like jazz?"

Nodding, Dowoon opened his mouth.

But in the manner of the elderly, Prince Buyeong went on without waiting for Dowoon to elaborate: "I have a grandson, you know, about your age ... Wonpilie is studying music now, at the RCM. Piano and something else — I forget. It's nice to see the interest seems to run in the family."

Younghyun looked at the way Dowoon's eyes lit up when his Great-Uncle had mentioned his cousin, and started making plans.

Plans that, once he let Captain Choi know, involved him spending his obviously copious amounts of spare time tailing Kim Wonpil around London whilst His Majesty was occupied with classes or safely ensconced at the embassy, doing coursework or discharging his royal duties.

"He went to the pub," said Younghyun flatly, at the weekly huddle. "He went to practice, and then he went to the pub. On Wednesday afternoon, he went to Islington Market with another young male in his early twenties. They ate shak—shakshuka and some croissant thing. It looked delicious. And then he started talking to a bustler playing a keyboard and took over. They left after seven minutes and —" so on and so forth.

It was about a month of this torture later, during which Younghyun cycled very rapidly through the stages of grief for his spare time as well as his desire to eat all this food that Kim Wonpil and his various friends enjoyed, that Lieutenant Choi declared the all clear.

So it was on a Saturday that Younghyun found himself following Dowoon through Kentish Town to the council estate that His Majesty's Royal Cousin was renting a flat in (with the shakshuka friend).

"I don't like this," Younghyun reiterated.

Dowoon, playing oblivious, said, "I did offer to carry some of the bags, hyung."

On top of all his sense being on high alert, Younghyun was also laden down with the enormous Superdrug cotton reusable bags that one of the embassy staff had given them, stuffed to the brim with Corean snacks.

"Very clever," said Younghyun, and hitched one bag higher on his shoulder where it'd been slipping down. "And it's up ahead, I think. That block."

Thankfully, it did turn out to be that particular tall, brown-bricked block amongst all the other tall, brown-bricked block, because Younghyun was getting tired of carrying all these snacks up this neverending hill. He wasn't physically tired, but it was — it was tiresome. To be clear.

And then they'd had to find their way to the lift, and Dowoon got increasingly tense as the sixth floor approached. His back grew straighter and straighter as they approached the flat.

"Do you want me to ring the bell for you?" Younghyun inquired solicitiously.

Dowoon gave him an exasperated look and pressed the buzzer.

For a few seconds, they both held their breaths.

"Maybe he's not at home," said Dowoon, small and sounding a mix of relieved and disappointed.

"No, they definitely are." Younghyun hadn't followed Kim Wonpil around for a solid month not to have a grasp of the usual Saturday schedule of this flat. And there was also the watch that Sergeants Yang and Ok had set up earlier that morning. Not that Dowoon needed to know about _that_.

"Well, then maybe —"

Dowoon broke off when there was a loud thud and metallic clatter from somewhere inside the flat, and someone laughingly shrieked, "FUCK OFF YOU BINT!!!!"

They exchanged startled looks, as stamping footsteps drew closer, and there was the scraping sound of locks being undone and the door swung open.

*

There Cousin Wonpil was.

Dowoon recognised him from photographs that Lady Noh had shown him, and the more recent ones that Prince Buyeong had rustled up out of somewhere in his rooms at dinner.

He looked a little more unkempt in person; flyaway curls untamed by whatever magic had been worked on them pre-photograph, dressed in a soft, grey hoodie and matching joggers. He also clearly hadn't bothered shaving that day.

But the cheery smile on his face was the same, the wide joyfulness of it and the way the skin in the corners of his eyes wrinkled.

And then quite visibly, Wonpil registered whom he had opened his door to, and the mildly demented look of mischief just froze and smoothed away into blank shock.

"Oh," said Wonpil. "You're ... not Stephen from the down the corridor."

Dowoon opened his mouth, entirely at a loss. The speech he'd prepared in his head had slipped away. "Um, no. I — you — you _are_ Kim Wonpil?"

Kim Wonpil stared at Dowoon and then his gaze swung up to Younghyun, met _his_ eyes for about a second, before swinging back down to the bags overflowing with snacks in Younghyun's hands.

"Yes, I ... am. And you're — oh. _Oh_." He stepped away from his door and opened it wider. "Um, I suppose you'd...better come in?"

"Thank you," said Dowoon, relieved, and followed him into what seemed like a very small front hall. It looked more like a large stair landing; there were two doors off to the right of the one they'd come in through, and a set of stairs leading up, just across from the first door to the right, from which hung a chalkboard sign that said BOG.

The other door had a matching sign that very helpfully said NOT BOG.

Wonpil shut his front door after Younghyun had come in and started toeing his shoes off, all whilst doing his scanning the room thing.

"So ... um. What brings you here? And oh, of course you're already taking your shoes off, that's nice. You have no idea how many times we have to yell at visitors to — oh, I'm just babbling aren't I?"

Dowoon, who'd already kicked off his shoes and nudged them into a tidy pair along with the rest of the shoes lined up against the wall on the other side from BOG and NOT BOG, shook his head. And then nodded, a little confused by himself. "No, it's ... it's a different culture. Or the same for us, I guess. But ... I'm sorry to drop in on you like this, it's just ... I thought I should pay you a call."

With an entirely too insightfully wry smile, Wonpil said, "It hasn't got anything to do with _harabeoji_ has it? He said he was having dinner with you, last he came up to London."

"I — " Dowoon paused to gather his thoughts. "I did want to meet ... meet my cousin, in any case. But _chakeun harabeoji_ also ... uh —"

"Oh, say no more." Wonpil rolled his eyes. "I know what my grandfather's like. Well, I suppose we should — oh. Oh no. Hang on, sorry, please wait down here for a mo', I've just got to —" he paused and blinked hard. "Wait, is Corean better? Oh my days."

He was so flustered that Dowoon felt sorry, and abashed to have been so discourteous.

"English is fine," he said. "I don't expect —"

"No, no," said Cousin Wonpil in perfectly cut-glass broadcaster accents. " _Harabeoji_ always — oh. Oh. I almost forgot. Be back in a bit."

And then he was pounding way up the narrow stairs and bellowing, "JINYOUNGIE STAY UP THERE I HAVE TO —" and then his voice was muffled as a door slammed.

"Well," said Younghyun drily, putting his bags of snacks down. "That could've gone worse."

There was a yell that could not be muffled by any door, another slam, and then Wonpil's footsteps were thumping down the stairs again.

"Right, um, I — Your...M...ajesty?"

"You're my cousin." Dowoon tried very hard not to shrink behind Younghyun or run his fingers nervously through his hair. "I should think you can call me Dowoon."

"Wonpil- _daegam_ ," said Younghyun, "where should I put these?"

"Wonpil- _what_ — oh, oh my god, Couque d'Asse," Wonpil breathed reverently as he peered at the bags. "Right, yes, up this way please, we have a lounge...kind of."

He picked up the bag with the cookie box in and started thumping up the carpeted stairs. A little bowled over, Dowoon and Younghyun followed.

Wonpil and his mystery flatmate did have a lounge — it was a little, sunlit room that opened immediately off to the left from the small square of the landing. There was a squashy sofa shoved up against one long wall, and an odd assortment of wooden chairs clustered in the corner right next to the door. Next to the chairs was a long, low bookshelf that came up to about waist-height — it sagged with books and scores, and was surmounted by little action figurines, some small potted plants, a clay bust of Beethoven, and a television that seemed out of place with how expensive it looked.

"That was, um, _harabeoji_ 's present," said Wonpil sheepishly. "We mostly watch dramas on it. And the footie."

And on the far end of the room, under the windows, was a wooden table that looked just as scavenged as the chairs. "And that's um, sometimes we do coursework in here. The light's good."

Dowoon nodded. "It's very nice." It was entirely unlike any home had been in before.

"Where," asked Younghyun practically, "should I put these bags, _daegam_?"

"Please stop calling me that." Wonpil looked pained, before gesturing at the empty bit of wall between the sofa and the study table. "And here's just fine." He put his bag on the table, Dowoon noted, and tugged the box of Couque d'Asse biscuits out. "And um — oh god, where are my manners? Please sit down? Would you like some tea? I'll just go put the kettle on ..."

Younghyun, who hadn't sat down, said, "I'll help."

"Oh!" Wonpil looked flustered all over again. "Oh, I mean — it's just boiling water —"

He'd been about to say more, but then a door down the corridor banged open. Younghyun twitched and his hand drifted to his hip. Wonpil looked alarmed.

"Kim Wonpil!!!" shouted the heretofore unseen Jinyoungie, whose footsteps quickly approached. "You can't expect me to confine myself to my room for—"

A boy with big eyes and a snub nose burst in through the door and came to a screeching halt, his mouth dropping open as he stared at Dowoon. Younghyun inched halfway in front of Dowoon. Dowoon just thought that he'd never been around so many Corean people who spoke English like this before.

"Oh my god," whispered Jinyoung just as Wonpil burst nervously into giggles. "What the fuck?"

"Um ..." Wonpil made some weak jazz hands. "Surprise?"

"Sur _prise_?!!?" Jinyoung half-shrieked. "What the fuck, Pilie? I mean — " he blinked hard. "Sorry for swearing, Your ... Your Majesty? And ... whoever you are. Bodyguard, uh, _nim_. But, like, what?"

"That's why I told you to —"

"— what, and you were just going to have me sit in my room until they left?"

"I would've told you after!" Wonpil protested. "It's not like I knew they were coming!"

Dowoon winced and Younghyun gave him a look.

"I'm sorry," said Dowoon, "to impose on you so suddenly."

"Oh, no no no." Wonpil waved his hands about. "Just — actually, Jinyoungie, could you please go put the kettle on?"

"Put the kettle on," repeated Jinyoung tonelessly, raising an unimpressed eyebrow. "Okay, fine, but you're explaining to me why the King of fucking Corea is in my flat when I've come back."

"I really am sorry," Dowoon said to Wonpil in English — he thought perhaps given how overwhelming the situation seemed to have become that would be more considerate — when Jinyoung had sailed out. "I just ..."

"His Majesty," interjected Younghyun blandly, which is how Dowoon knew that he was judging the heck out of this entire situation, "had thought perhaps this" — he gestured at the bags of snacks — "would be more personal than a calling card."

Wonpil laughed a little hysterically. "I don't think I've ever received a calling card in my life."

"To be fair," Younghyun said, and to Dowoon's surprise smiled a little, "I don't think His Majesty has either."

"Did you know that I would be — in the country?" Dowoon asked curiously, after a lull in the conversation.

Wonpil pressed his lips together, and the tips of his fingers too. "Ummmmmm ... sort of. _Harabeoji_ said something about it when we were visiting with him over the summer. But, well, it's never been ..." he spread his hands helplessly, palms facing up. "Please don't be offended, but you've never quite seemed real to me. Or, I mean, obviously you exist. But that we're cousins, of a sort, has never ... seemed real."

"I understand," said Dowoon. Because — well, he did. The prospect of having a cousin, a _hyung_ who didn't have to play multiple roles in his life, had been ... exciting, and exactly like a dream. "I ... me too."

When Wonpil was still, like this, Dowoon thought, he could see how they might be related to each other. There was something about his gaze when he looked at Dowoon, that reminded Dowoon of what he remembered of his own _harabeoji_ ; clear-eyed and true.

Then Wonpil smiled and clapped his hands. "Well! But it's all very real and you're here now and I suppose we can get to know each other, and — and you've brought snacks!" He leaned over to pick up the cookies where he'd put them down on the sofa when his flatmate had burst in, and started tearing the box open. "I love these. So much."

As though summoned by the prospect of snacks, Jinyoung backed his way into the room, holding a tray with several mugs brimming with milky tea.

"Uh, why aren't you sitting down?" he said to Younghyun, who indeed had still been looming in the corner next to the door, before putting the tray down on one of the chairs.

"Younghyun-hyung," said Dowoon, "please sit down."

Younghyun shot him a look, before taking up two mugs and sipping at both of them.

"What the fuck," said Jinyoung, before his eyes widened. "Oh my god, you're a bodyguard. Oh my god, you're _really_ the King. I'm not getting trolled right now."

"No," Younghyun said drily as he handed Dowoon a mug, "you aren't."

"Holy fucking shit," whispered Jinyoung. "But ... why?"

Dowoon opened his mouth, but was beat to the punch by Wonpil.

"Jinyoungie, you should probably sit down for this."

Jinyoung sat, clutching his mug.

"So ..." Wonpil trailed off, before his eyes turned to Dowoon, flicked up to Younghyun (who still hadn't sat down but was perched on the sofa arm), and then back to Jinyoung. "You know my grandfather down near Bognor?"

"What, the one who collects things and is weirdly posh?"

"Yeah," said Wonpil. "That one. He's, um, he's —"

"My great-uncle," Dowoon cut in, having finally remembered the English word for it.

There was utter silence as Jinyoung stared. Then he glanced between Wonpil and Dowoon, back and forth. "But you two don't —"

"Oh, you know I look like my dad!"

"But if your dad's _his_ uncle then —"

"Genetics!" cried Wonpil impatiently.

"I don't think I'm processing this," Jinyoung said faintly, and raised his mug to his lips. Dowoon thought he'd never met so many people as dependent on tea as he had before coming to England. "But you know what. It's fine. I just live here. You ... you have your family reunion. _Family_. Christ."

*

Being best friends with Wonpil meant getting used to a certain innate weirdness, but this was beyond the pale.

By the time Jinyoung reached the bottom of his tea mug, Wonpil and his second cousin _the King of Corea_ were chattering on about jazz and music and Wonpil's bizarre grandfather's record collection and the possibility of a jaunt down to bloody Bognor.

And Wonpil's second cousin's bloody bodyguard — because Wonpil's second cousin was _the bloody King of Corea_ — just sat on the sofa arm and watched them emotionlessly like a massive weirdo. A massive weirdo who was decimating the bulk pack of sausage cheese snacks all by himself.

And then it finally came home to Jinyoung. Sort of.

"Wonpil!" he burst out, interrupting probably some sort of lovely cousinly bonding moment. "You mean to say all this time you've been like _fifteenth in line to the succession of the Corean throne_???"

Startled, Wonpil really did look a little bit like a deer. "Um, I don't —"

"THIS WHOLE BLOODY TIME?"

"I think it's eighth, actually," said _King Dowoon, King of Corea,_ also apparently _Wonpil's cousin_.

"Am I?" Wonpil asked in wonder.

Jinyoung stared between the both of them, and then shook his head rapidly. "EIGHTH!!!!!"

"I mean!" Wonpil protested. "It wasn't ever going to happen! My parents are solidly middle-class, you've met them!"

This was true. One would never have guessed that Uncle was a _prince_ , to look at him. He was an accountant who looked like he'd never met a hairbrush in his life, for fuck's sake. He had a spreadsheet tracking his favourite chip shops all over the country. Quite possibly traitorously, he loved HP sauce more than gochujang.

"And we live in a little council house in Reading!" continued Wonpil. "Mate! Calm down!"

"There is a KING," said Jinyoung in what he felt were very reasonable tones. "In my FLAT."

"Well, get used to it," said Wonpil a little stroppily, which Jinyoung felt was very unfair. But Wonpil did get up to sit down next to Jinyoung.

And then Dowoon, King of Corea, Cousin of Wonpil, intervened. "You seem ... very close?"

"We've been friends since sixth form," said Wonpil, bumping shoulders companionably with Jinyoung. "The only Coreans in our college."

"Though that doesn't mean anything, of course," Jinyoung rushed to add. "We could've ended up hating each other."

"We might still," said Wonpil cheekily. "It's always a toss up with this one."

And lo, the massive weirdo of a bodyguard huffed out a laugh. "You're definitely good friends," he said.

"No we aren't," Wonpil said. "I just live here and have to put up with him."

"Wow," said Jinyoung. "Thanks, mate."

This time, Dowoon laughed. "It's nice, I think. Where in Corea is your family from, Jinyoung-sshi?"

Judging from the way Wonpil bit his lip, he hadn't missed the way Jinyoung had just tensed up all over at being directly addressed with a question by the _King_ of _Corea_. His own loving halmeoni would probably throw him off a boat if he wasn't polite.

"Oh, um. Your own — I mean, Busan. Your Majesty." And then in the interests of being honest, he elaborated, "Well, more like near Busan. Do you know Jinhae? May as well be in Busan."

Jinyoung thought that Dowoon must be the most self-possessed eighteen-year-old he'd ever met, to not even blink in the face of his nervous babble.

"Yes, the island." Dowoon smiled, and it wasn't one of those camera smiles. "It's very peaceful on the islands. And please, you're Wonpil-hyung's close friend, you can call me Dowoon."

It was probably only because Jinyoung wasn't quite up to meeting His Majesty's eyes just yet that he saw the bodyguard's — Younghyun's — right cheek twitch. Next to him, Wonpil was making approving noises that he 100% got from his no-longer-so-inexplicably posh grandfather.

"Ah, well, um." Jinyoung tried to avoid Younghyun's laser gaze. "Dowoon...nim. I'll keep that in mind." And then — having had quite enough of this oddness, he got up to his feet. "Right. It's been lovely meeting you, but I've got all this reading to do, so ... see you again? Yeah?"

Wonpil was already laughing as he fled the room whilst wishing Dowoon and Younghyun a safe trip back to whatever hideously posh bolt they lived in.

He'd managed to plough through all his essential readings for his next tutorial when Wonpil knocked on his door and stuck his head in.

"They're gone now," he said, smiling faintly. "So you can stop hiding."

"Did that guard leave any snacks behind?" Jinyoung asked, to cover for his embarrassment. "Or did he just annihilate them all?"

"There are three whole massive bags of snacks, Jinyoungie," Wonpil said drily. "And one of them is just lined with Homerun Ball packets."

"Oh, what?" Jinyoung scrambled to his feet. "All is forgiven."

"Is it?"

Jinyoung paused and looked properly at Wonpil. Underneath the utterly Wonpil-like acceptance of a new relative (who was a _monarch_ ) and said relative's shadow, there was a strain of uncertainty. Wonpil wouldn't have talked for actual hours with Dowoon...the King if he didn't actually like him, or get on with him. This, Jinyoung knew, was important.

"I mean, I still cannot believe this," said Jinyoung. "I need time to just. Get used to this.... All of this. But more importantly: I get dibs on the Homerun Balls. And first shower tonight."

*

Somehow, Jinyoung got used to the bloody King of Corea visiting them. With his personal guard, always — Wonpil'd rustled up some article from the motherland that had called Younghyun " _the perfect shadow_ ", which he honestly sort of was. He was very hard to get a read on. Which Jinyoung supposed was the point. Inscrutable Royal Guarding and all.

Except for his fashion sense. Dowoon laughed when Jinyoung made a comment about exceedingly gothic hoodie that Younghyun had turned up in on that particular visit and said that it was supposedly part of his cover.

Blankly, Jinyoung said, "His cover is to dress like the late 2000s knocked and are wanting emo back."

Younghyun, who had been assisting Wonpil with putting away the by-now customary bags of snacks, fortunately did not hear.

To Jinyoung's horror, Dowoon canted his head in puzzlement to one side. "Emo?"

"It's — it's —" he was still struggling to find an explanation when Wonpil came into their lounge with the tea tray, Younghyun holding the door open for him.

"Have you actually managed to render Jinyoungie speechless, Dowoonie?" Wonpil asked with interest, setting the tray down on a chair. "All the makings of a king indeed."

"I don't know," Dowoon said, though he was grinning.

Jinyoung thought he looked years younger — looked precisely like the 18-year-old he was supposed to be, when he smiled toothily like this: a little silly and shit-eating. He sort of understood, in moments like this, how Wonpilie had taken so quickly to this random cousin whom he'd never met before, who'd shown up at their door out of the blue.

Wonpil had always wanted a younger sibling, and it seemed like the fact that his cousin was the King of Corea posed no obstacle to him immediately unleashing every single nurturing instinct he had on Dowoon and subsequently doting on him. Jinyoung was rather put in mind of a fluffy kitten trying to order a lab puppy about — and succeeding, bizarrely enough.

"He doesn't know what emo is," Jinyoung explained, having had a fortifying gulp of tea.

Wonpil blinked, then glanced from Jinyoung to Dowoon to Younghyun, who was busy ignoring them all and settling down at the study desk with his economics textbook and laptop and a pack of chocolate-covered coffee beans. Younghyun, who'd apparently decided his cover meant wearing black all the time and highlighting his hair and owning a collection of hoodies all with prints artistically edgier than the last.

"You're better off not knowing, probably," Wonpil told Dowoon, lips twitching. He deposited Younghyun's mug next to him on the table, before perching on the arm of the sofa, tucking his socked feet under Dowoon's royal thigh. "One good thing about that palace education."

"I did go to school," said Dowoon, sounding injured.

"He went to the equivalent of, like, Eton," put in Younghyun.

Curious, Jinyoung asked, "You didn't?" He'd sort of imagined Younghyun had been grafted onto Dowoon's side since time immemorial.

And then, miracle of miracles, the unreadable mask cracked a little as Younghyun huffed out a laugh. "With my parents' incomes? Of course not. It's not like I was a guard when I started junior high."

And just like that, he became a little less incomprehensibly remote, and a little less intimidating. Jinyoung would absolutely insult his fashion sense to his face now, and — he glanced at Wonpil and barely managed to hold back the eyeroll. Wonpil definitely didn't find him incomprehensibly remote, though of course Wonpil'd apparently grown up with a _prince_ for a grandfather, and _was_ a prince of some sort himself, so —

Yeah, no, it still boggled the mind.

Jinyoung was probably never going to get used to this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for reading so far (if you have clicked into this madness!) please comment etc, much appreciated, <3


	3. Cousin Wonpil Moves In

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> honestly just fuck the tories

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my uploading schedule, if anyone is wondering, is when I remember to*
> 
> *but I am aiming at once or twice a week.

"The Tories continue to be terrible," Wonpil said in response to Dowoon's "You all right?" when he'd come in through the door. He'd picked that one up very fast.

Just the evening before, Wonpil and Jinyoung had got home from classes (and practice, and work) to a notice slipped under their door. Their landlord was selling the flat and they had eight weeks to get out, in essence. Neither of them knew if that was actually legal, nor did they have the time, energy or wherewithal to contest it.

After listening to their tale of woe, Dowoon got a certain look on his face and said, "Well, you could always come and —"

Wonpil and Jinyoung turned immediately to look questioningly at Younghyun, who looked like he was about to have the mother of all headaches.

Nevertheless, Dowoon carried on. "— live with us. The house is certainly big enough."

Wonpil was fairly certain that if he told his parents, they would tell _harabeoji_ , who would either shake out some terribly posh pied-a-terre or instruct him to go stay with his cousin _anyway_.

Given the choice between living in a terrace flat full of his grandparents' random knick-knacks and being subject to _harabeoji_ 's random inspections whenever he came up to London from the old pile near Bognor Regis the family had bought ages ago when they'd come over, and ... living in some undoubtedly also terribly posh house in, god knows, South Ken ...but also with his cousin, whom he liked a lot. And his cousin's terribly attractive bodyguard.

"I'd have to think about it first," said Wonpil carefully. "I mean! It's — I'd love to, and you're being very generous, but you know, got to talk to the parents..."

"Oh, for fuck's sake." Jinyoung rolled his eyes, having been privy to Wonpil's minor breakdown after Dowoon and Younghyun's third visit. Younghyun had seen their fridge whilst retrieving milk for tea, almost had a conniption, and then conducted a one-man rehabilitation campaign — accompanied by deeply sarcastic commentary — on their kitchen. "You _should_ go, Wonpilie, auntie's hardly going to object."

Wonpil blinked at him. "But — what about you?"

"Oh," said Jinyoung airily. "Just leave me here to rot, homeless, in Camden." He then collapsed dramatically across their grotty sofa.

Despite knowing full well that he was being manipulated, Wonpil turned back to Dowoon — who was biting down on a grin — and declared, "Well, all right, but only if Jinyoungie can come along."

Younghyun cleared his throat urgently, finally putting away the foolscap pad he'd been scribbling on.

And Dowoon really was fast becoming Wonpil's favourite cousin, never mind all his other ones, because he turned in tandem with him to look imploringly at Younghyun.

"Is," sighed Younghyun, "a free education really worth this?"

But he went and worked out all the security things, and of course Jinyoungie didn't turn out to have some sort of dastardly traitorous past, so they got on with things and spent Reading Week doing minimal reading and maximal moving.

"Things are easier when you've got money, aren't they?" Jinyoung marvelled as Dowoonie's security entourage were wrangled by Younghyun into schlepping the contents of their flat into a miniature fleet of black cars and down to the townhouse in Belgravia that Dowoon and Younghyun had apparently been knocking about in all by themselves.

"I thought you'd have a staff," said Wonpil, as he knelt in front of the refrigerator and transferred cans of cider from the chiller box over. "Or was that some sort of security thing?"

"Both," said Younghyun, who was making lunch. "That and — it seemed excessive, for just the two of us. There's a cleaning lady from the embassy who comes around twice a week."

"Goodness," said Wonpil, and started in on the tupperwares full of banchan and things that his and Jinyoung's eommas piled them with whenever they went home.

The rest of the security team had decamped to the pub down the road after piling up their bags and boxes in the front hall, leaving the four of them behind to "fully experience moving in like a real university student", as Corporal Yang had said a touch too cheerfully.

"We've done it twice," Jinyoung had muttered darkly. "Must I suffer for the sake of verisimilitude?"

"Consider it a sacrifice for the crown," Younghyun had told him, and hefted a gym bag stuffed full of Jinyoung's clothes into his arms.

When Wonpil went up to fetch Jinyoung down for lunch, he found Jinyoung gleefully putting up his Dowoon poster and humming to himself.

"You can't be serious!" he cried. He remembered visiting with Jinyoungie for the first time in sixth form, to study together. He'd walked into Jinyoung's childhood room, seen a poster of his royal cousin in some sort of terribly formal _hanbok_ looking grimly off to the side, and had burst into nervous giggles.

Jinyoung started cackling so hard he sat down on the floor.

"You haven't had that up since you moved to London! Jinyoung! This isn't funny!" Wonpil stamped his feet.

"This is very, very funny." Jinyoung wiped his tears away. "Look, I'll take it down if your cousin wants me to, all right? It's just facing a wall, anyway." Which it was — Jinyoung had tacked it up on the side of some antique wardrobe that probably was never meant to marred by bluetack.

But before Dowoon learnt about it, Younghyun did first, on one of his routine bug sweeps. Because he did have a sense of humour, he'd let Jinyoung labour under the misapprehension that he was just very zealous about rats for about two weeks, before Dowoon had taken mercy.

Wonpil only learnt about it later, when Younghyun found him in the sitting room.

"Is this ... something I should be concerned about?"

It was only because Younghyun _had_ looked so concerned (and slightly disturbed, possibly in the way one would upon realising that one's sibling-of-sorts had been and apparently was fanciable) that Wonpil didn't extend the joke.

"No, no." Wonpil put his pencil down so as to seem fully serious. "Jinyoungie just thinks he's very funny."

"But ... he _has the poster_."

"He got over it ages ago," promised Wonpil, biting down on his smile. Younghyun's professional concern was steadily heading into anguished disconcertment. "Really, I don't even know where he dug it up from, because he didn't have it up in our flat."

Younghyun let out a very human sigh, long and low, before slumping back into the chair he'd dragged over to the writing desk. He covered his eyes with his forearm and muttered something Wonpil couldn't quite make out in Corean; Wonpil suspected it was very uncomplimentary.

"It's also from his nan," added Wonpil. "So you know, I expect it's got sentimental value."

And that, as Wonpil hoped, did turn out to be the nail in the coffin of Younghyun's objections.

Dear old Dowoonie had merely been flustered and confused, but ultimately fell back on whatever sort of lessons in Kingship they'd given him as a child (a child!!! Wonpil's brain sometimes bewailed).

"If it's something your halmeoni gave you," said Dowoon, "then of course you should treasure it."

Jinyoung looked touched and then patted Dowoon cautiously on the arm. "You're good people."

It was Dowoon's turn to look touched.

"But you." Jinyoung turned to scowl at Younghyun — he still hadn't quite forgiven Younghyun for the rats ruse. Or for letting him make a fool of himself. Or for turning out to have an unexpectedly wicked sense of humour. Or all three, Wonpil wasn't very sure. "You are not good people."

"Oh no," said Younghyun flatly. "However shall I go on."

Despite himself, Wonpil giggled.

"Oi! Traitor!" Jinyoung whirled around to tug Wonpil in and shake him. "I'm your best friend, here!"

"It was a little bit funny."

"I'm all alone in the world," said Jinyoung grimly. "Get out of my room, all of you. Except Dowoon-sshi. He's on my side."

"I'm don't think —"

But Dowoon, also displaying a streak of wickedness, was already nodding and smiling — no, he was grinning. "Hyung skipped checking your room for two weeks because he wanted you to believe the rat thing for longer."

"Dowoonie!" Younghyun cried in disbelief, protocol entirely forgotten in the face of this betrayal.

Not wanting to be left out of the fun, Wonpil said, "How remiss in your duty, C — wait, do you have a rank? What's your official title?"

"Hyung's technically a lieutenant," said Dowoon after he and Younghyun had shared an awkward look. "But — well."

"One more year," sighed Younghyun. "This is what happens when you train part time."

"Formal education is important too, hyung." Dowoon looked thoughtful for a moment. "And trying to minimise accusations of nepotism."

"In any case, " said Younghyun, "get ready for regular home invasions now then, Jinyoung."

"Living here," Jinyoung said, "is going to be so weird."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> now that I am no longer knackered, I have made [a promo tweet for this. if this gave you a giggle or made you feel An Emotion, please kudos, leave a comment and/or ](https://twitter.com/forochel/status/1277047187470520320)[retweet](https://twitter.com/forochel/status/1277047187470520320), thank you!


	4. The Kang Younghyun Uni Experience

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> alternative title: officer cadet kang has no social life.
> 
> kim wonpil, prince, also of reading, to the rescue!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> feeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeelingssssssssss

Younghyun was very much aware that the average university student did things like go to lectures (or not), tutorials and seminars (less easy to skip), possibly did some coursework in the library or one of the many cafes of London (or the union bar), and then went to the pub and the club after.

He, on the other hand, had two degrees' worth of lectures to go to, and then his job. And no way to explain the latter. He had toyed with just telling the truth, but Lt. Choi had just stared him down with that intimidatingly penetrating gaze. It all had to do with how big his eyes were.

"Mate," said Jez (Jeremy, posh, had some improbable double-barrelled surname) to him after one Friday afternoon seminar, "do you want to do this marketing competition thing with us? It's only prelims for now, but we've got the rest of term and Christmas hols to really develop our pitch."

Younghyun paused. He'd _like_ to, but what he liked to do hadn't exactly factored overmuch into his life since he'd been sixteen.

"Let ... let me check my calendar." He retrieved his tablet and unlocked it, in the faintest hope that perhaps Dowoon's royal engagements might have thinned out overnight.

Behind Jez, Nadja (Russian, very tall, volubly not a fan of Putin) said in what she probably thought was an undertone to Eoin (Irish, very proud of it): "That's a very polite no."

Younghyun looked up from his tablet and arranged his face into an appropriately sheepish expression. "Sorry, I'm all booked up. Especially over the, um, Christmas holiday — family stuff. It gets intense."

"Really?" asked Jeremy. "Do you celebrate it?"

Nadja smacked the heel of her palm into her forehead and muttered, "Oh my god."

Suppressing the urge to laugh, Younghyun said, "Not really — but we celebrate the solstice. W — I am going home, this December. The time zones alone ..."

"Oh, all right, but what a pity."

"Maybe next time," said Younghyun, putting his tablet back into his satchel, and made good his escape.

*

Some things that have been said about Kang Younghyun, possibly at one of the union bar socials that he had attended once at the start of term and then never again:

"He's solid, he really is," said Matt. "Reliable on group projects —"

"— which is all you can really ask for," interjected Sahar, who'd been burnt already by an unfortunate group assignment in another class.

Eoin leaned over to add, "But have you tried getting him to come along to the pub?"

"He's got to have ninja blood in him, like he always manages to just disappear." Jeremy, who'd tried several times to wrangle Younghyun into the rugby trials.

"I think that's racist, mate." Matt squinted at Jeremy. "He's Corean."

"I asked him if he was coming along to Scala last weekend and he just smiled and said he'd think about it," Nadja said gloomily. "And then I got distracted by bloody Ciara and next thing I knew he was gone."

"Probably knew you'd try to get him drunk and and into your bed," Eoin — who did not fear death — said.

Nadja gestured wildly. "Wouldn't _you_?"

"All right, so next time we have a study session _here_ , right after the Wednesday morning lecture." Matt interjected.

Domnhall, who'd been quiet up til now, piped up. "Well, you know, he might just be partying with the ... the ..."

"The rich Asian kids club," Kaori, who was solidly not amongst those Funky Buddha ranks, said drily. "It's fine, you can say it."

"I really don't think he's the partying sort."

"Oh, come off it, Matt," said Jeremy. "Have you seen his hair! His piercings! Does he look like a swot to you?"

"Musn't judge," said Sahar, who knew all about being judged. "Even if his clothes remind me of my fourteen-year old cousins."

"You have to respect someone who's that committed to the emo aesthetic," Dom said, grinning a little now.

"I would be very happy," said Nadja archly, "to fully communicate my respect."

A chorus of hoots and groans rose up around the table, so it was probably for the best that Younghyun had had to run to Dowoon's lecture right after Basic Principles, and then would be occupied after that with a very exclusive charity benefit that Dowoon had been obliged to put in an appearance at.

*

Wonpil, coming back from chamber ensemble practice and then probably the pub one evening, poked his head into the sitting room where Younghyun was studying.

"Hi," said Younghyun, who'd caught Wonpil's reflection in the dark window. He smiled to himself when Wonpil seized up all over in shock for a splitsecond, eyes going wide.

"Oh, I hate it when you do that."

Turning around, Younghyun smirked. "Be aware of my surroundings?"

"Well —"

"— Sorry," said Younghyun lightly, "occupational hazard."

Somehow, this made Wonpil's face fall.

Younghyun opened his mouth to try and salvage the situation — he had meant to make a _joke_ , but Wonpil beat him to it.

"Right, of course." Wonpil bit his lip. "But I was going to say ... Dowoonie...I understand, I suppose. But you, Kang Younghyun, why are _you_ at home all the time. It's a Friday night!"

Leaving aside the objective fact that Wonpil wasn't exactly out on the lash either, Younghyun tried to find a nice way to tell Wonpil that he'd had at least one security shadow ever since moving in. In fact, ever since he'd become a known, close associate of the King of Corea, Wonpil had started popping up on several international lists that sometimes made it hard for Younghyun to sleep at night. And Younghyun was, by nature, very good at sleeping.

"Lots due next week," is what he settled for. "And _pyeha_ has appointments through Sunday."

Dowoon, of course, was in the kitchen studying next to the oven, currently throwing off heat and the rich malty scent of Younghyun's procrastinatory bread. Dowoon'd had something about kitchens ever since they'd been little.

"Well, must you be at _all_ of them?" Wonpil had his hands on his hips, looking a little like Younghyun's own eomma when she started scolding.

Trying not to laugh at the sudden mental image, Younghyun shook his head. "It's my responsibility."

Wonpil huffed and pouted, folding his arms. Despite the month of observation at a distance and now weeks into observation ... up close and personal, as it were, Younghyun wasn't sure whether Wonpil knew what his face was doing when he was dissatisfied or upset or ... or any other number of feelings. He was terrifyingly easy to read.

"Well, I sup _pose_ ," he said, and turned to go. Halfway out of the sitting room, he paused, glancing back. "Oh, and I've locked up all the way. Jinyoungie texted to say he's on the pull tonight."

Younghyun grimaced.

Wonpil laughed. "The funny thing when you make that face is that I _know_ you're not thinking that he's a slag, just that he might be abducted and sold for parts in Crimea or something."

"I —" Younghyun started.

"— yes you are," said Wonpil cheerfully. "But it's all right, really. Neither of us has managed to be kidnapped and sold into sexual slavery yet."

Biting back the _you too???_ , Younghyun sighed. "And I'd like to keep it that way."

*

But as would turn out to pattern life for the next few years, Wonpil got his way sooner or later.

A chance meeting at a pub on TCR — Wonpil brightly agreeing to his attendance at a coursemate's house party — said coursemate thus confidently sending him the facebook invite — led to Younghyun reluctantly tying his laces in the vestibule on a Saturday night and wondering if he should bring a bottle of contributory wine.

"No you do not," said Wonpil, who was supervising him. "Or, well, certainly not any of the vintage in this house. Stop procrastinating. Go have fun. Dowoon and I and also the entire retinue of guards you think I don't know about can take care of ourselves!"

"I never thought that —"

"We'll stay inside ALL NIGHT," Wonpil continued, "and be very good. Won't we, Dowoonie?"

Dowoon, who was merely relieved to have a night entirely to himself, nodded furiously.

"Have fun, hyung." He smiled that warm, awkward thing that was the Dowoon smile at home, and waved.

So off Younghyun went, and on the way he bought a ten quid bottle of wine at the Tesco nearest to Eoin's place because he felt very strange turning up to someone's house with his hands empty.

It was fairly obvious which flat Eoin's was — the Irishman having not got his residence forms in on time — with the music thumping out of it and the enormous Irish flag hanging from the window.

"Oh my god," Eoin shouted when he flung his door open. Younghyun just managed to dodge being brained by it. "It's Brian! Mate! I didn't think you'd actually come!"

"Well..." Younghyun held out the bottle of wine. He never should've told them what his Starbucks name was. "I did."

"My god," said Eoin, taking the bottle in one hand and gesturing Younghyun in with the other. "It's posh plonk."

"It was only a tenner," said Younghyun.

"It doesn't come in a box," said Domnhall, who'd turned up at Younghyun's elbow. This flat was entirely too small for the number of people squeezed into it. "Therefore it's posh."

Younghyun thought of Wonpil saying _and certainly not any of the vintage in this house_ , and had to suppress a smile.

"Duly noted," said Younghyun, and let Eoin pull him into the tiny galley kitchen. There was a clump of people leaning up against the counters and cabinets lining either side of the wall, none of whom Younghyun recognised.

"The corkscrew's somewhere down there, last I saw," said Eoin, squeezing past them. "Oh, right — this is my flatmate Saoirse whom I do not in fact know of olde and some mates of hers — and this is Brian, or — how d'you say your actual name again?"

Younghyun enunciated it slowly, though given the way Saoirse and her friends were already clearly at least one and a half sheets to the wind, he wasn't sure it'd help.

"Yeah, Younghyun," Eoin parroted. "He's brought good wine."

"Ooh, la," said one of the girls closest to Younghyun.

"It really isn't..." Younghyun stopped talking, because it was clear that nobody was listening to him. "Also —" he reached out to grasp Eoin's forearm "— Eoin, this is a screwtop."

"Oh," said Eoin, "nice. Let's get you a mug, then."

And so Younghyun came to be sipping slowly at a mug of Spanish red and propping up the wall (a Royal Guard's accustomed habitat) in the living room of Eoin's flat, somehow still the nucleus of a cluster of his coursemates, who'd found him by pure dint of Eoin bellowing "OI YOU LOT GUESS WHO'S TURNED UP!"

"I can't believe it," Nadja marvelled, downing about half her ... whatever it was she was drinking. "How on earth...?"

"Oh," said Eoin, slinging an arm about Younghyun's shoulders, "well, I ran into our friend here and his friend at The Rising Sun last Friday evening —"

"— that pub!" Dom exclaimed. "I've been meaning to go!"

"— yes, yes." Eoin waved him away impatiently. "So there I spotted our elusive target —"

"Target?"

"— with a mate and said mate was such a mate I suspect he's single-handedly responsible for Brian's presence here tonight."

"A mate?" Ellie (from Kent, which had some kind of flower festival apparently). "Why didn't you bring your friend along?"

"Uh," said Younghyun, "was he invited?" He tried to imagine Wonpil at a party like this, but couldn't, even though he must go to them. Or have gone to them.

Ellie sighed. "Oh my god, this isn't really that sort of party."

"Bring him next time!"

"How do you know him?" Nadja asked. "Or, I mean —"

"We live together." Younghyun examined his wine critically. And then up into a circle of faces that were distinctly shocked. "I mean! We're housemates. With two others."

Somehow, that segued into making everyone laugh with every single outrageous Jinyoung (ft. Wonpil) anecdote that he'd collected in the short time they'd been acquaintanced.

" _Definitely_ bring them next time," said Kaori, who'd turned up even later than Younghyun with a pack of Strongbow under her girlfriend's arm.

Younghyun, who'd started in on a second mug of wine without quite realising it, smiled and said to Eoin, who'd bounced off for a while with Nadja and then returned with some non-Economics people in tow after two anecdotes, "Your flat wouldn't survive them. The house barely does."

And then he'd had to explain about Wonpil's misguided attempts to cook everyone dinner ("it's always either you or the embassy, hyung, I feel bad") and Jinyoung's misguided attempts to help him ("Why not just indulge their whole noblisse oblige — oh, all right, I'll help") had almost ended up in a house fire —

Which turned into some bizarre sharing circle of cooking mishaps that made Younghyun determined never to risk his life eating any of their food (except Matt, who'd appeared all suspiciously dishevelled from somewhere else in this flat, and looked horror-struck enough that Younghyun thought perhaps they might be fellows in this).

"Didn't you say you have a fourth flatmate?" Matt shook his head. "Housemate."

"Ah." Younghyun paused, and realised that he was almost at the bottom of his second mug of wine. Carefully, he went on, "Yes. He — he doesn't really cook either."

Not that Dowoon hadn't tried. Now, with Wonpil's patient tutelage, he could fry an egg and cook ramyeon in a pot on the stove, which honestly put him up over Jinyoung the kitchen disaster.

"A house of boys," sighed Ellie, shaking her head. "Reminds me of my brother and his friends."

"It's not _that_ bad," Younghyun objected. "Wonpilie just refuses to go near knives because of his fingers."

"Who's that?"

"Oh —" Younghyun shook his head. "Um, Wonpil, the friend at the pub. He plays piano. Hey, I'm just going to get some water."

When he emerged from the blissfully underpopulated kitchen — only a pair in there, talking quietly to each other with bottles dangling loosely from their fingers — with a bottle of water in hand, Dom caught him by the arm and started pulling him towards the cluster of people on the far side of the room.

"What —"

"Brian, you've got to join in, you're Corean," declared Dom, who was very red and very drunk.

"Are we drinking soju?" Younghyun asked, mystified.

But no, Eoin and his flatmate apparently had a DDR set-up, and Nadja was aggressively jumping around on the arrows, occasionally cursing angrily in Russian when she missed a combo.

"Why does —" Younghyun started.

"-- Gangnam Style!" exclaimed a dark-haired guy who was entirely unknown.

Younghyun frowned. "That's not —"

"Oh, fuck off," said Kaori lazily to Gangnam Style. "DDR's _Japanese_."

" _Blyad_!!" shrieked Nadja, possibly in solidarity, but possibly also because she'd almost tripped over her own feet.

"Give it a go!" Dom pushed him over to the mat. "Come on, we haven't got expectations, really."

Feeling exasperated, a little challenged, and with Dowoon and Wonpil's twin admonishments to have fun in mind, Younghyun put his water bottle down on the rickety IKEA table next to the sofa.

About two songs later, a hush had spread out from the epicentre that was the DDR mat, as Younghyun ignored everyone and narrowed his eyes at the tv screen. This couldn't possibly be harder than having to learn taekwondo katas or fancy evasive footwork under the onslaught of Sergeant Jung.

"Why is he taking this so seriously," whispered Ellie.

"He's fucking _killing it_ ," whooped Matt. "Mate, you're smashing it!"

"He might rival Sahar for DDR champ," said Nadja, who'd collapsed onto the sofa, breathing hard. "Rematch necessary. But during Sahar-friendly hours."

Younghyun stepped off the mat whilst the game was loading up the next song, though, and picked up his bottle. He was sweating a little, and feeling a little embarrassed. The exertion had definitely made the pleasant wine haze go away.

"That was wicked," Dom told him. "We have to do that again."

Ah — again. Younghyun smiled the blankest Royal Guard smile he had in his arsenal and unscrewed his bottle. "Perhaps."

As he took a swig, Nadja groaned and pressed her palm to her forehead. "That means no, guys, have we not learnt?"

"Awwww. No!" Eoin leapt at Younghyun, who side-stepped him on pure reflex. "Mate, haven't you had fun?"

Younghyun, who'd finished his water and was still in need of more hydration, pat him on the back. "Lots, yeah. Thanks for, uh, the invitation. Sorry —" he waved his empty bottle "— I need another water."

"Oh, wait, but —" and suchlike protests started up, but it was too late.

Younghyun slipped behind some of Saoirse's friends, who'd come over to take up the DDR gauntlet and back to the peace of the kitchen.

The nice thing about the layout of this flat was that the kitchen was across from the door, so that it wasn't any trouble at all for Younghyun to make his way from kitchen to coat rack to door, and then he was free.

*

When Younghyun got home, tired but satisfied, Wonpil was curled up in front of the fire atop a heap of cushions, looking half-asleep.

The vinyl player that Jinyoung had transplanted from some corner of the house was crackling away in the corner, playing some sort of warm-sounding old violin piece.

"Yah," said Younghyun, too tired for English, "why aren't you in bed?"

"Why are _you_ home? It's —" Wonpil wiggled about to look at the old ticking clock next to the log heap " — it's barely one."

"I had had enough." Younghyun padded over and sank down next to Wonpil, who'd curled back into comfort atop his cushion tumulus. "You know, for someone who doesn't actually go out a lot, you're very enthusiastic about making me."

"There is, Kang Younghyun, a ... a... oh, what's the word for it? A _spectrum_ " — he resorted to English — "between being all work and no play, and 'going out a lot'." Wonpil made little bunny quotation marks with his fingers.

"Well, I went out and played." Younghyun bopped Wonpil gently on the head with the water bottle he'd brought home from the party, before unscrewing it to take a swig. All this language-switching was giving him a bigger headache than the thumping dance music at the party. "So I'm not boring anymore."

"I didn't say you were."

"You _implied it_."

Wonpil slit his eyes at Younghyun. "I've never thought you boring. Just that you might want to make more friends than just me and Jinyoungie."

"I have friends," said Younghyun defensively. They were just ... his fellow guards, all of whom were at least 3 years older than him, or high school friends left behind in Corea. He was pretty sure the coursemates he sat with during lectures and worked with on group projects and whom he'd just spent hours at a party with considered him a friend, too.

Wonpil gave him a deeply unimpressed look, and then yawned so wide his mouth seemed to take up half his face.

"Don't fall asleep here." Younghyun poked him in the side, and was a little disconcerted to hit what felt like rib very quickly. "Yah, get up."

Squeaking in protest, Wonpil rolled off his tumulus. Sitting up on his haunches, he looked at it despairingly.

"Leave it." Younghyun pulled him up to his feet and started pushing him to the door. "It's late."

"I'll deal with it tomorrow," promised Wonpil as he let himself be chivvied along.

A little while later, as Younghyun was about to leave Wonpil behind on his landing and continue up to the floor that he shared with Dowoon, he felt a little resistance tugging at his sleeve: Wonpil, fingers tugging a lightly at the hem.

"But — hyung," murmured Wonpil, blinking stickily, "did you have fun?"

Something — some weightless sensation rather like the in splitsecond after a rollercoaster dropped had Younghyun's stomach lurching, then. Wonpil, he realised belatedly, hadn't just been curled up in front of the fire because he liked listening to old crackly classical music late at night.

"Yeah" — what else could Younghyun say, really — "Yeah, I did."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as always if this made you feel a ling, drop me a line, hit that kudos, and [please retweet](https://twitter.com/forochel/status/1279535233394790400)!


	5. A Taste of Heaven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> chaos twinks jinpil almost abscond with king dowoonie to the foremost gay venue in london; younghyun almost has an aneursym.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I might be slightly tipsy as I title & summarise this chapter. 
> 
> also: feelings intensify

It was near the end of November, a few weeks after the party at Eoin's, when Younghyun looked up from his laptop and promptly choked on his coffee. "Where....what... it's a _Monday night_. It's almost the end of _term_."

For Jinyoung and Wonpil had just walked into the sitting room, wearing tight, ripped jeans and extremely weather-inappropriate t-shirts. Younghyun had kept the lights low, studying mainly by the light of a drop lamp near the fireplace and the fire itself, but when Wonpil hurried past him, the light glinted off what _had_ to be glitter on his face.

"What —"

"I'm looking for my hoodie," Wonpil said, sounding harried. "I could've sworn I left it somewhere in here."

Younghyun, still at a loss, tried very hard not to stare at the strip of skin bared by the way Wonpil's miserable excuse for a t-shirt rose as he bent to look at the basket of throws and blankets they kept by the divan.

"Aha!" crowed Wonpil, dragging a thin, white hoodie that seemed — colour aside — indistinguishable from all the other hoodies that he owned out of the basket. "Knew it."

"Congratulations," said Jinyoung drily. "Shall we go? I assume _you_ aren't interested." He addressed this last to Younghyun, who was still staring.

"But it's ... almost ... the end of term?"

Wonpil smiled at him. "It's just one night. And — oh, where's Dowoonie?"

"What do you mean where's _pye_ —"

And then, to his ultimate horror, His Majesty popped his head into the room, similarly togged up (minus the glitter). When Dowoon had acquired a pair of ripped jeans, Younghyun would very much like to know.

"They said there was a jazz bar in Soho, hyung," said Dowoon hopefully.

"That — " Younghyun closed his laptop and got to his feet, feeling the adrenaline kick in "— is not what people wear to a _jazz bar_ , Dowoon-ah."

"Really?" Dowoon looked across the room at Wonpil, who looked caught out, and Jinyoung, who merely looked amused. "Then, where..."

"A club, Dowoonie." Wonpil glanced quickly at Younghyun and away again. "It's, um, a landmark institution."

"Culturally significant," Jinyoung put in, a little too helpfully.

"Oh," said Dowoon, before turning back to Younghyun. "I'd like to go with them anyway."

Younghyun closed his eyes briefly, before taking his phone out. "Please inform me in advance of jaunts like this in the future, _pyeha_. What's the name of this club?"

"Heaven," whispered Wonpil, clutching his hoodie to himself and turning a little pink about the ears.

"Heaven," repeated Younghyun woodenly, and would've pursued the suspicious blush and also the name of this club, except then Lieutenant Choi thankfully picked up, and Younghyun was occupied with giving him a rapid update of the situation whilst pulling the spare knives out of the sofa. Good thing he hadn't changed into sweatpants when he'd got home.

"WHY," demanded Jinyoung shrilly in the background, "are there KNIVES in the SOFA?"

"Shall we all just go finish getting ready whilst Younghyun sorts things out?" Wonpil asked a little desperately.

Whipping around, Younghyun pointed at them and lifted the phone away from his mouth a little. "Stay there! Do not leave until I say so!" And then, his gaze falling on the papers that had been scattered around him — "Fuck, my report's due tomorrow afternoon!"

"You could just stay in," said Jinyoung faintly, who still hadn't quite recovered from the retrieval and subsequent disappearance of the knives about Younghyun's person.

He got a scathing look for his pains, whilst Younghyun stomped out of the room with another warning glare to go get his other gear, still on the phone with Sergeant Yoon, whom Lt. Choi had deputised to communications whilst he sorted things out.

The terrible two were slightly cowed by the time an embassy car, driven by Sergeant Ok, arrived.

It turned out they were going to Charing Cross, not Soho, and that it was going to be impossible to bomb sweep the entire club at the last minute. On the other hand, Lt. Choi had in the intervening half an hour mobilised an entire section of the security detail to the club and also had worked some kind of backdoor magic to the effect of them being let in ahead of the VIP queue under the arches.

("We'll debrief tomorrow," he'd said to Younghyun on the phone in the car, despite the fact that he _knew_ Younghyun had back-to-back lectures and tutorials — not all of which were his own — all day until 1800.

Younghyun had just barely held back from sighing.)

And then they were in a large, warehouse-like hall that was dark and heaving with bodies shimmying and writhing to the kind of music Sergeant Ok played in the car when she was driving.

"Wow," marvelled Jinyoung, as they were led to a table in one of the large rooms that split off from the main chamber. "Maybe we should have you along all the time."

" _No_ ," shouted Younghyun over the thumping beat, and slid into the booth. Wonpil, who was standing next to him and peeling his hoodie off, trembled with inaudible giggles.

Rolling his eyes, Jinyoung shouted, "Spoilsport!" back before he and Wonpil disappeared to go get drinks.

"Are you okay?" Younghyun asked Dowoon, who'd slid into the booth after him, and was looking around with a vaguely shell-shocked look on his face.

Nodding slowly, Dowoon continued staring. "I'm fine. This is just ... very loud."

"Wow!" Wonpil exclaimed, returning with two bottles in his hand. He handed both to Younghyun. "I've never got drinks that fast before. I just got you beer."

"Beer's fine," said Younghyun, and commenced taste-testing.

Jinyoung, who'd been hard on Wonpil's heels, handed him a shot glass that was filled with three layers of different liqueurs: golden brown, cream, another brown. "Shots, Pilie. And then let's get out there."

They downed their shots in eerie synchrony, and then Wonpil turned to Dowoon. "You can stay here and get used for now, Dowoonie, but I'll come back to check on you!" He pat Dowoon on the head, and then looked at Younghyun, who'd already settled in with his tablet and report and beer. "Um. Okay. I — okay."

"Let's _go_." Jinyoung tugged impatiently at Wonpil's arm, and they were disappearing into the press of bodies, Wonpil casting one last worried look back at them.

"You're happy to watch, Dowoonie?" asked Younghyun, tapping at the table with his stylus.

Dowoon nodded. "Ah, yeah."

"Okay, then." Younghyun turned back to his report. "Just let me know if you want water or something."

The next time he looked up, Dowoon was watching the dancers under the strobing lights with his mouth slightly agape, eyes dark and wide. Entirely unconscious of the irony, Younghyun thought how His Majesty — Dowoon — had been robbed of any sort of a normal youth, and felt a pang under his sternum.

At that moment, Wonpil resolved out of the mass of people, alone and limned with sweat, grinning gleefully as he approached. He looked ... a little tipsier than he had when he'd left.

"Are you ..." Younghyun searched for the words. "Are you okay?"

Wonpil's eyes were wide as he tipped his head, pouting a little in confusion. "Yeah? Why do you — oh!" He laughed a little, eyes creasing. "Oh, hyung, I'm fine. People just ... free drinks, you know?"

"Wow," said Dowoon, while Younghyun struggled not to broadcast his alarm too obviously on his face.

"Very wow," Wonpil agreed, eyes still smiling. He tugged at Dowoon's arms. "But oh, come dance with us, Dowoonie! Younghyun can boring by himself here."

" _Yah_ , you brat —"

"— N-no, it's okay, Wonpilie-hyung." Dowoon shrunk back a bit.

Wonpil pouted, turned it on Younghyun for a brief, searing moment, and then spun away back into that neon-streaked mass of bodies.

"If you stayed near ..." Younghyun started, even though all of his security instincts screamed against it. "... well, you could—"

"Ah—" Dowoon laughed and ran his fingers nervously through his hair. It was one of the few tics left to him.

Younghyun caught the eye of a fey young thing over Dowoon's shoulder; they had been looking at His Majesty in a manner most unfittingly covetous. The kid flinched, and did an about-turn.

Unnoticing, Dowoon shook his head and inched a little closer along the low, padded seat in the circular booth that they'd laid claim to. "No, hyung, I can't dance — um, not like _that_."

He — and by extension Younghyun — had been subject to a long childhood of dance lessons. But those were a courtlier kind of dancing; the slow, elegant steps of traditional Korean court _jeongjae_ , and then later on, for diplomacy, the stately steps of a slow waltz.

His Majesty had worked hard to overcome his two left feet.

Quirking a smile of understanding, Younghyun shrugged and went back to his tablet. Coursework — and most importantly, Professor Cutter — waited for no man.

"But," Dowoon said suddenly after an interval, putting his bottle of thoroughly vetted beer down on the table top, "hyung, _you_ dance!"

"No," said Younghyun flatly. He stabbed harder at the statistics programme on his tablet with his stylus. "Absolutely not. That would entirely defeat the purpose of my being here."

Dowoon frowned thoughtfully and was about to say something when the terrible two tumbled back into the booth, flushes visible even in the dim club, illuminated by passing shafts of the strobing lights. Their hair was damp with sweat and still sparkly with glitter.

"Bo~ring!" Jinyoung carolled. "Dowoon-sshi, when you said you were curious" — His Majesty had said what — "I didn't think you meant you just wanted to, like, conduct a — a— an-anthropomorphological study!"

"Anthropological," said the third that the terrible two had brought back with them. "Jinyoungie. Anthropological."

She was an alarmingly beautiful woman with a slinky kind of knowing grin that immediately made Younghyun go on high alert.

Dowoon, who'd — alarmed — slid even closer to Younghyun, stiffened. After so long growing up together, and then with Younghyun serving as his personal guard once Younghyun had finished basic training, Dowoon had become attuned to Younghyun's finest cues.

"This is Sunmi-noona," Jinyoung said breathlessly. "She was my floor warden, first year in halls."

Younghyun recognised the name, and now the face under all the club make-up. From the dossier they'd put together on Jinyoung.

She was a PhD student at SOAS, born in Iksan, Jeolla-do, and had spent the last ten years in London. No known ties to any enemy faction, or the usurper.

She also absolutely recognised His Majesty, if the momentary twitch of shocked realisation that crossed her face was any indication.

Younghyun locked his tablet and put it carefully away into the net bag he'd shoved in his pocket, everything else having been stored in coat check.

There were of course, two others of the Guard in the club within sight. But it was crowded, and here was — an intrusion that was unanticipated, but still ... not something Younghyun really wanted to have to handle when half his brain was occupied by stock market indicators.

Wonpil and Jinyoung were blissfully ignorant — also blissfully _drunk_ ; and as for Dowoon... Younghyun wasn't ever sure if he was resigned or just ... something. Younghyun hoped he felt safer with them around. In any case, Dowoon had started noticing them, eventually.

They'd decided it was good situational awareness for any monarch who wanted to survive to 50 to have.

"Sunmi-sshi," Younghyun started, nodding a polite greeting. He'd been about to engage in some small talk when abruptly, there was a long line of giggly boy pressed warm and very drunk up against his arm.

"Hyung," Wonpil sang. "Hyuuuung, Dowoonie will never make any friends if you scare _everyone_ away with your face."

Reflexively, Younghyun protested, "I can't help my _face_."

On his other side, Dowoon snorted.

The rank betrayal!

Younghyun tried to peel Wonpil off himself without tipping him out of the booth altogether. "And I think you've had quite enough, Wonpil-ah."

Across the booth, Sunmi was saying something, _sotto voce_ , to Jinyoung; he couldn't hear her over the thumping bass and general _noise_ of this place.

Wonpil whined and clung — he was so, so drunk. Younghyun decided that the flip in his belly was nerves about his nearly finished report due the next day, and the analysis he'd had to try to do with EDM pounding through his entire body. He shoved a water bottle at Wonpil's face. It was slippery with condensation, and Wonpil fumbled at it.

"Mwuh?" Wonpil blinked up at him, doe eyes sleepy and — Younghyun cut off _that_ train of thought. His long pianist fingers finally had the bottle steady in hand, and Younghyun let go. "How?"

"Magic." Younghyun tore his eyes away to do a scan of the club. There — at four o'clock, one of the men from the embassy, and at twelve o'clock old Yoon. "Drink up."

Softly, Dowoon told Wonpil, "Just accept that he has his ways."

Sunmi met Younghyun's gaze when he brought it back to the table.

"You're dee-dee?"

Younghyun stared at her. "Dee...dee?"

"Oh." Sunmi laughed, barely covering her mouth with her fingers — like a forgotten habit. She switched into Corean. "You're in charge of being sober tonight?"

"...Yeah," he said. It was basically accurate.

"Poor you." There was a knowing little twist to her smile; next to her, Jinyoung was drinking a shot that had _not been there before_ , oh my god was he going to have to take one of them to the A&E tonight. "Don't you ever get to have fun?"

"Hyung has fun!" Wonpil stirred and protested on his behalf. Younghyun reached out and steadied the water bottle in his hands. "He just — um. Not tonight? Sorry, hyung."

Younghyun shook his head and turned back to Sunmi. "Not tonight, apparently. I'm just babysitting."

"I'm not a baby!" Jinyoung and Wonpil protested as one.

Sunmi threw her head back with laughter this time. "Okay, well. I'll take this one off your hands for you." She pulled on Jinyoung's ear. "Come on, kid."

"I'm not a kid," sulked Jinyoung.

"Yeah, okay, Nyoungie. I saw that miscreant Jaebeom somewhere in here earlier."

Jinyoung's eyes lit up — wearily, Younghyun made a note to himself to request a dossier on this Jaebeom — and Wonpil groaned ... unsettlingly close to Younghyun's ear.

"Not him," mumbled Wonpil.

Next to Younghyun, Dowoon — or, well, very much His Majesty in this moment — looked politely bemused.

"Oh, shut up, Kim Wonpil," said Jinyoung as he slid out of the booth and took his denim jacket with him. "Just because _you_ —"

Again, _much_ too close to Younghyun's ear, Wonpil let out a protesting scream.

"Ow, fuck," said Younghyun, as did everyone else on the security team, who'd received direct input to their earpieces.

Sunmi, who was now Younghyun's possible favourite non-royal person in this club, just rolled her eyes and started dragging Jinyoung away, into the crowd, as he cackled.

"I hate him," Wonpil said woefully, still performing his best impression of a koala.

His Majesty, who'd untensed into Dowoon now that a strange woman whom he didn't know and was — too beautiful to be photographed with _in a nightclub_ was gone, laughed and reached over to tousle Wonpil's matted hair. Younghyun noted that the setting spray was losing its hold in the heat of the club, and that it was already curling back into its natural mess.

"No you don't, hyung," said Dowoon, "or else you wouldn't have bullied Younghyun into letting him move in."

"I did not _bully_ — " Wonpil, it appeared, was a conscientiously honest drunk. "...did I?"

Younghyun tapped the table twice with his forefingers, and then heaved Wonpil up.  
"I think it's time to go home, no?"

"Unless you want to dance some more, hyung?" Dowoon asked, courteous right to the very end.

Wonpil stumbled a little, looking surprised at being upright, and then looking more surprised when Younghyun dropped the hoodie Wonpil had left behind to go dancing around his shoulders.

"No, it's no fun without someone else to dance with."

Younghyun tried to make Dowoon stand up with the power of his eyes. It didn't work.

"I'm sure there's lots of people out there who'd like to dance with you, hyung."

Wonpil, who was _still holding onto Younghyun for support_ , shook his head, and then swayed. "But I don't know them ... and I think I'm done for the night. Really, Dowoonie, let's go home."

After the coat-check and fielding the palpable sense of relief that they weren't stuck with personally herding His Majesty's Cousin (and His Majesty) from everyone else, they were finally ensconced in one of the embassy cars. Younghyun drove, of course; Sergeant Ok was hitching a ride back to the embassy with the others.

Wonpil was stretched out in the backseat, his head on Dowoon's lap.

"If he vomits, _pyeha_ ," said Younghyun, "turn his face away from you."

"I'm not _that_ drunk," objected Wonpil.

"Let's not risk it," Younghyun said drily, and turned on the radio.

"I wouldn't want to vomit in a car as nice as this, anyway."

Wonpil mumbled it, but — well — he was drunk and the radio wasn't on very loud, and Younghyun was reminded all over of how ... how jarring this must be. Jarring for a boy who'd only really known himself as Kim Wonpil from Reading, with distant relatives in Corea, an eccentric grandfather, and a mythical cousin who was supposedly the King, and whose grandfather was the reason they had an uncle in Patagonia who reared sheep with the Welsh-speaking community tucked away in some high, green valley.

And he could very well have turned his back on them, when they'd appeared at his door, but ... here they were. Wonpil had welcomed them into his established patterns of life, decided to share his best friend with them, and had undertaken to teach Dowoon (and Younghyun, by extension) about the superiority of British baking.

There had been — concerns, amongst those closest to Dowoon, in the Palace, about whether he'd be able to make friends.

But he had, possibly due to Wonpil's influence — Wonpil, who could be so strangely shy and exuberant by turns, who tried his best to get Dowoon to go along to pub nights with his music friends, and made Younghyun take Dowoon to the Linguistics department socials.

It had worked, somewhat. Dowoon had made friends with a very dry young Englishwoman improbably named Yseult who'd said "Oh, god, the empire, what an embarrassment," and then proceeded to switch into Japanese and discuss the entire plot of Fullmetal Alchemist in excruciating detail with Dowoon for the next three hours.

And Okwe from Jazz Society, where Dowoon went sometimes to sit and — for him — radiate envious longing as the band jammed. He hadn't talked to anyone for the first few weeks, while Younghyun propped up a wall in the corner and kept one eye on him and the other on the guitar section. And then a drummer had sat down next to him and struck up a conversation. The contrast had been very humorous at first — Dowoon's slight, upright figure, next to Okwe's broader, slightly hunched over posture, like he was apologetic for being quite so tall.

Wonpil had looked thoughtful when Younghyun mentioned this offhand over washing up after dinner one day. Whatever thoughts he'd been turning over in his mind then still hadn't borne fruit, but Younghyun ... Younghyun found that he trusted them to.

So the least he could do, really, after seeing His Majesty through the door, was carry Wonpil up to his room and make sure he drank another bottle of water. And brushed his teeth. And washed his face.

"You're like a hen," Wonpil murmured, face still obscured by his face towel. "A mother hen."

"Uhuh."

"Which is funny, because you're all foxy, but foxes eat chickens."

"Do they?"

Wonpil shrugged. "The farmer told us so."

"The farmer?" Younghyun tugged the towel away from Wonpil's grasp; his hands had been still for the last 30 seconds.

Wonpil's eyes were mostly closed; his face was pink and damp and unbearably _real_ , with the little scar along his right temple, and the impending post-alcoholic-binge breakout.

"Mmmhmmm." His hum was sweet and fuzzy as Younghyun herded him out of the bathroom and into his own room, two doors away. "In Bucks. We went, in primary school."

"Okay."

Wonpil'd changed into his pyjamas earlier, while Younghyun peered out of his window — he had a nice view, of a plane tree and a good bit of garden.

Now, Wonpil was climbing into bed and Younghyun felt distinctly awkward watching him do it. Nevertheless. It wouldn't do for His Majesty's Cousin to fall out of the ridiculously tall bed and break his drunken neck.

With Wonpil safely under his duvet, Younghyun turned to go.

His hand was lifting from the light switch when from behind him —

"Hyung?"

"Oh. Um, yeah?"

"Were you very bored tonight?"

The sheets rustled and the bedside lamp switched on. Younghyun turned back and — he hadn't had a _drop_ to drink, so there was no reason. No reason at all to feel this lurch low in his abdomen.

Wonpil was squinting at him from within a halo of golden light, his hair a hastily rinsed and towelled-dry mess. He was pouting again, apologetically this time.

"...No?" Younghyun reconsidered. "No. Perhaps, um, challenged, but I've worked under ... more challenging circumstances."

Wonpil sighed and hugged a pillow to himself. "I always forget, even when you're pulling — pulling _knives out of the sofa_ ... that you're." He waved a hand. "You know."

"It's a different world from Reading, I'm sure," Younghyun said.

"You're being all weird and formal again." Wonpil blew out a breath and pushed his forehead into the pillow. "I like it more when you're just yelling at us to stay put or die."

"I don't--!!"

Wonpil laughed. "But, hyung, I'm curious — if it were just me and Jinyoungie going out, would you have come along?"

That — that was a question that Younghyun didn't know how to answer. Now that Wonpil was a known associate of His Majesty, he was in ... a certain amount of danger. But was that level of danger enough to warrant pulling the King's personal guard off his primary duty?

No, but ...

"If I had been able to," he said carefully, "it would ..." then he gave up. "Perhaps a different sort of place."

Wonpil nodded. "Dowoonie said you like live music more. Your birthday's soon, isn't it?"

Younghyun — had not been aware that Dowoon had been discussing. Discussing him with others.

"Yes," said Younghyun cautiously. "But we have exams, and reports due. Essays, for — for you." He shifted. "Wonpil-sshi —"

Wonpil made a dissatisified noise.

Despite himself, Younghyun couldn't help but laugh. "I can stop talking about coursework, if you'd like. "

"No" — Wonpil sounded indistinct, talking as he was into the pillow — "It's just ... you can drop the formality, you know." And then, so small and quiet Younghyun almost couldnt catch it, he said, "You said Wonpil-ah, in the club."

It wasn't physiologically possible, but Younghyun felt like his heart had dropped into the pit of his stomach.

Swallowing hard, Younghyun said, "Well. Good night, Wonpil-ah," and went.

*

**jilbert** @jxes · 1 day  
omg appaz this is the king of corea #Heaven #StudentNight [blurry pic] [less blurry pic]  
****

**yeri pak** @mugunghwaiting · 13h  
Replying to @jxes  
hey you might want to take that down there's a media moratorium on the king before he reaches his majority (20 in corea)  
****

**pye♥** @dxkfljs0129 · 11h  
Replying to @mugunghwaiting @jixes what is Heaven?

**.**

**every day a little closer** @haruharu · 1 day  
KING DOWOON IN #HEAVEN, ARGUABLY THE MOST FAMOUS GAY CLUB IN LDN LIVING HIS BEST LIFE?! WITH "PERFECT SHADOW" KANG YOUNGHYUN? (and two other guys?) [pic] [pic] more pics from @jxes:  
pic.twitter.com/hFnM9Gk2d

 **Charlie R** @amsterdamn · 3h  
Replying to @haruharu wait THAT guy? He was just sat in the booth all night w the fit one. Cute tho x

 **every day a little closer** @haruharu · 1h  
Replying to @amsterdamn @haruharu !!!!!!!!! omg of COURSE you were there!!! somehow that's also just really cute ㅠ__ㅠ

*

**From the Office of Public Engagement, Gyeongbokgung (Busan)**  
[Press Release, 2013-11-29]

The Corean Royal Family prides itself on being a modern Royal household and extends its warm feelings and support to the LGBTQ+ members of the Kingdom of Corea. Previous statements on this matter may be found here, here, and here.

The Royal Office of Public Engagement would also like to gently remind all that the moratorium on King Dowoon's appearances in media is in effect until His Majesty reaches the age of Corean majority. This will be in Summer 2015. The Palace will protect His Majesty's utmost privacy to the fullest extent of the law.

We respectfully request the public's understanding and respect for His Majesty's right to his private life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> MASSIVE shoutout as per to bysine, the wind beneath my authorial wings, potato to my leaves, idek what I'm saying anymore. thnks fr (all) th mmrs ... reading thru yr gdoc comments while copying this was a blast.
> 
> to whoever else may be reading: hope you're having fun! drop me a line, kudos or something idk, and [retweet](https://twitter.com/forochel/status/1281752726603476998) please! really appreciate the likes but I'm old school and love comment threads. I WILL REPLY. anyway, mostly: talk to me! I don't bite!


	6. The Piano Technician in the Drawing Room with the Plier

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> wonpilie make a discovery; youngfeel are just blindingly obvious to everyone other than them; austenian metareferences are made.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> muchas gracis as per to bysine whose painting my gdoc yellow is 50% of the reason this fic exists 
> 
> (the other 50%, obviously, is kang "hearteyes" younghyun)
> 
> this piano is a shoutout to my godparents' piano for being weirdly but not terribly out of tune for something that hasn't been tuned in over a decade.

Shortly after Christmas hols, during which Dowoon and Younghyun had flown back to Corea to assure everyone of His Majesty's continued good health and partake of the Solstice festivities, Wonpil discovered the piano room.

Younghyun had been on his way back up from putting together a snack in the kitchen when he heard, unexpectedly, some bright piano notes running together, going up and up and then vaulting back down with a very emphatic plonk. He wondered briefly if Wonpil was listening to something for coursework, but then the phrase repeated itself again, and then once more, so it couldn't be a recording.

There _was_ a piano in one of the smaller rooms towards the back of the house, but none of them ever really bothered with the other rooms. Other than Younghyun, who _had_ to, just in case.

Following his ears, he made his way past the sitting room and further down the corridor to the door that was set a little ajar. As he got closer, the sounds of a piano being played got louder, and he found Dowoon standing just inside the door.

Dowoon turned with a finger pressed to his lips, eyes wide with a warning. Quietly, Younghyun edged into the room.

Across from the door, tucked into a corner next to the large window was a sturdy upright piano. Younghyun hadn't thought much of it when he'd discovered it, though now he felt retroactively foolish not have told Wonpil about it sooner.

Wonpil was sitting at the piano, doing what Younghyun assumed were exercises. There was a black file open in front of him, and a few books piled up on the piano bench next to him. His face, whilst he played, was arrestingly serious.

After another emphatic _plonk_ , Wonpil heaved a sigh and hunched over, turning to look at them.

"It starts going flat," he said woefully, "after this B." He lifted his hand and hit a white key on the right hand side of the keyboard, before playing a series of notes one after another up from that B.

It definitely sounded weird. But other than that the timbre of the piano itself was quite lovely.

They went over to stare at the piano, as though looking at it might reveal its secrets.

"Does it?" asked Dowoon, tilting his head. "I guess it sounds a bit weird?"

"Oh, just listen —" Wonpil played the B that was flat with his little finger, and then with his thumb hit another key, lower down and sounding almost the same, together. The octave sounded _almost_ right, but off by just enough that it was uncomfortable. "— it doesn't ... it's just not in tune."

"Well, it probably hasn't been tuned for years," said Younghyun. "But we can fix that."

Dowoon nodded. "I'll have the embassy arrange for a ... a ... for someone."

"That isn't really —"

"— I'll do it, I'll do it," said Dowoon. "Someone should play it anyway, that's what instruments are for."

"Oh, Dowoonie," said Wonpil fondly, and shifted his books aside to slide down the bench and give him a hug. "You _are_ good people."

*

But for reasons that began and ended with _security_ , it was taking the embassy ages to wrangle a tuner, apparently.

"I'm sorry, hyung," said Dowoon over dinner one evening, when Wonpil was actually at home and not rehearsal or practice or accompanying a friend's recital.

Wonpil sighed, but he was smiling a little anyway. "It's all right, by this point I really ought to have expected it, oughtn't I?"

What _Younghyun_ really ought to have expected was Wonpil's uniquely Wonpilian method of cutting through a problem.

One miserably dreary day in late January, a few weeks after the piano discovery, Wonpil brought home one of the technicians from the college, having apparently promised her a pint and to accompany her teenaged daughter for an under-16s competition.

"Ah, hyung," he said cheerfully, when Younghyun looked up from tying his bootlaces. "I'm getting the piano tuned!"

Younghyun started unpicking the knots on his boots and took out his phone. "And...this is...?"

"Pil, _bachgen_ ," said the sturdy woman just taking off a bright yellow coat slick with rain, "you might've told me sooner you were posh."

"Oh, it's not me," said Wonpil, gesturing at her to take her shoes off. "It's my cousin."

Unwillingly, Younghyun exchanged a look of mutual commiseration with this wholly unexpected guest.

"Weren't you going out, hyung?"

"Not anymore," said Younghyun, and then turned to the still mystery guest. "I'd shake your hand, but well, they're dirty."

"Very considerate of you....?"

"Younghyun." He retrieved some slippers for their guest. "And yourself?"

"Megan, and — slippers. That's new. Thank you."

"It's a Corean thing," said Wonpil, who had slipped into the fluffy bunny ones that Jinyoung'd bought him as a joke present from Accessorise. "Or just an Asian thing? I don't know, but it's draughty in here."

"Oh, that's just all these grand old houses for you," said Megan, already following Wonpil deeper into the house. "That can't be good for the piano."

Younghyun followed grimly after.

"No...but it still sounds quite good. The room it's in isn't half-bad." Wonpil glanced back, and made a complicated face at Younghyun.

Younghyun made one back that he hoped said _This is your just deserts for springing surprise guests on me_. He'd been supposed to go escort Dowoon home from the embassy, but — well. His Majesty was safe enough there, with all the rest of the Royal Guard around and the embassy's own agents besides.

He occupied himself with messaging back and forth with Sergeant Yoon, privately updating Dowoon on the situation, all while listening to the same fucking key on the piano being played over and over while Megan did complicated things with pliers and a tiny felt hammer to the piano's innards. Wonpil cheerily chatted — _gossiped_ was probably the better word for it — with her in between keys being tuned.

How _long_ was this supposed to take? Younghyun shifted against the wall and wished he'd had a textbook to hand. This wasn't a bad room for studying either; it was south-facing and had two large windows, good artificial lighting, a fireplace, and a writing desk tucked under one of the windows. Two deep armchairs in the Chesterfield style stood at angles to each other before the fireplace, a low table between them, and a chaise longue was shoved up against the wall on the far side of the fireplace next to a standing lamp.

"So ..." Megan popped out of the piano and eyed him. "Trying to make sure it wasn't the piano technician in the drawing room with the plier?"

"Oh, um —" Wonpil stammered. "Um, no, he, um — "

Younghyun shrugged fluidly, and sauntered over to the piano. "I'm not _trying_."

"Goodness," said Megan, "your boyfriend's a protective 'un."

"He's not — !!" Wonpil squeaked, ears going quite red.

Younghyun felt the heat in his cheeks, and resisted the urge to duck his head.

Megan grinned at Younghyun over Wonpil's shoulder, her small dark eyes twinkling. "I'll say no more." She then ducked back into the piano, leaving them to strenuously not look at each other in shared embarrassment.

*

But Younghyun thought in the end it was a very nice thing to have the piano discovered. Wonpil liked having one at his disposal at home very much.

"No need to fight for practice rooms!" he said delightedly. "And she really is quite a beauty." patting the piano fondly on the side.

They all got used to hearing him practise, and Younghyun gained newfound respect for professional musicians, because Wonpil practised at least four hours a day. They all got used to hearing the same few phrases over and over again for an hour. There was something nice, anyway, as Dowoon observed, about hearing someone who liked music so much playing, and generally just having live music around.

Especially when Wonpil got to the run-through stage of practising a piece.

"And it's very helpful for my composition coursework too," said Wonpil. He'd turned up with a manuscript book after dinner and given Younghyun, who'd settled in at the writing desk with his laptop and a sheaf of graphing paper, an apologetic look.

"I don't mind," said Younghyun, and shook out his earphones. "Really, go on."

It wasn't just Younghyun who took to the piano parlour for non-music purposes. In the evenings, sometimes, they'd all do their homework in there instead. It was smaller and cosier and less draughty. Less grand, too. They'd transplanted what Younghyun suspected had been used as a buffet for the formal dining room; it served very well as a communal study table.

On one such evening, Wonpil finished playing something pleasantly spritely, something you could dance to like in an old movie, then paused and laughed, shaking his head.

"I feel like I'm in an Austen novel. Playing the pianoforte after dinner in the drawing room. La, Mr Darcy." Wonpil played a few thoughtful bars of whatever he'd been practising, before smiling up at Younghyun. "Or Mr Kang?"

"Uh," said Younghyun, not having read any Austen.

Ensconced under a bright yellow fleece throw on the chaise longue on the other side of the room, Jinyoung rolled his eyes behind the book he was annotating.

"No, you're much nicer than Mr Darcy," Wonpil decided.

Still very, very lost, Younghyun smiled uncertainly. "...thanks?"

"He hasn't a clue what you're on about, Wonpilie."

Wonpil twisted around further to look at Jinyoung. "What?" Then he winced. "Oh, ow, my back."

Putting a hand on his narrow waist, Wonpil drew his knees up onto the bench so that he was perched sideways, facing Younghyun and only having to turn his neck a little to see Jinyoung.

Apologetically, Younghyun admitted that he didn't have any idea what Wonpil was talking about.

"Oh!" Wonpil's mouth dropped open a little. "But — oh, is this because you don't have a noona?"

"I don't think Dowoon has watched either movie either, Wonpilie," said Jinyoung drily. "Let alone read the book. _He_ has a noona."

Dowoonie, Younghyun noted, had wisely slipped his earphones on at some point (possibly when the terrible two had started bantering) and was concentrating on his strange esoteric linguistics charts.

Younghyun himself had been meaning to settle in at the same table as Dowoon, but then Wonpil had started practising and he'd been drawn like a moth to light. He'd then spent the next — he checked the clock — half an hour just leaning against the tall side of the piano, watching him. Wonpil hadn't seemed to mind.

" _Gongju-mama_ ," said Younghyun, "has always been more partial to the sciences, herself. Though she has also been a patron of the arts."

Jinyoung mouthed _Gongju-mama_ with a look of incredulity on his face.

"My noona plays the flute," Wonpil offered, idly going through some sort of pretty-sounding exercises with his right hand.

"What a musical family," said Younghyun. The last time he'd picked up an instrument had been before he'd started training with the Royal Guard.

Wonpil grimaced. " _Harabeoji_ used to make us do impromptu recitals whenever he had friends over, when we were visiting him."

"You know," said Jinyoung, who'd put his book down, "so many things about your childhood and your grandfather make sense now that I know _he's an actual, literal prince_."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wash your hands! wear a mask when you go out! take care! also I've realised this is a short one so I might post the next this weekend as well.
> 
> and *youtuber voice* please let me know what you think in the comments down below! also [retweet](https://twitter.com/forochel/status/1284308951111262209) if you'd like, thanks~


	7. Enter the Sungjin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> younghyun makes a friend! food, obviously, is involved.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please suspend all disbelief re: our choice of sungjin's vocation. we did it for the lulz. 
> 
> bysine: as always, you are the japchae coverlet to my plain old bap, #1 writing buddy.

* * *

Younghyun made his first true friend in London through an unfortunate incident at a little hole-in-the-wall far out in Zone 5 that Agent Shim had told him about. It tasted so much of home that he made the trek down on a rare day off from uni _and_ work. It was crowded as always, and one had to share a table as a lone diner as always. He didn't really mind. It had been ages since he could relax into eating elbow to elbow in a crowd of strangers like this. Not that he minded his duty, of course, but ... this was nice, too.

What was _less_ nice, however, was the guy dressed all in black next to him stealing his banchan.

Because the ajumma running this place was determinedly traditional, the banchan did get topped up whenever it looked like the sweet stewed potatoes were running low, or the banchan thief next to him made off with yet another sheaf of marinated beansprouts. But honestly ... Younghyun was just here to work his way through his bowls of kalguksu and mindblowingly delicious japchae-bap (how could something so simple taste _so good_?)

 _And_ the really, really excellent beansprouts.

Which were disappearing yet again.

Pushing his emptied kalguksu bowl away, he turned to the banchan thief and said, "Yah! Stop stealing my banchan!"

Banchan Thief's big eyes went even bigger and his thick eyebrows rose up his forehead. "What the heck, dude? _You_ 've been eating _my banchan from the start_!!!! I just decided to switch our plates!"

Things screeched to a cinematic stop. Younghyun looked down at the table; crowded as it was, his dishes and Banchan Possible-Not-Thief's jostled up against each other. It was entirely possible that this had happened.

"Well," said Younghyun, feeling a little ashamed. "Do you want some of this japchae-bap?"

This seemed to take some of the wind out of Banchan Not-Thief's sails. "Oh. Well, it's not like we haven't been accidentally sharing our banchan anyway."

Now that he was less worked up, the prosody of Younghyun's neighbour's speech caught his ear.

"Wait ..." Younghyun turned to look properly at his neighbour, who had a strong face and even stronger eyebrows when looking at him up front, as well as hair pulled back into a messy little tail. "Are you perhaps ... from Busan?"

"Yes! Are you?" Banchan Not-Thief had a very expressively mobile face; he looked intrigued and a little confused. "Hmm? But you don't _sound_ like it.”

"Ah..." Caught out, Younghyun cast around for an excuse. "My family is from near Seoul. But I grew up in Busan."

"Oh — well now that you mention it, maybe I hear a little bit of an accent."

Getting tired of calling his neighbour various banchan-related monikers in his head, Younghyun asked, "But, sorry, how do I address you?"

"Oh, right." They put their chopsticks down and performed a very squashed handshake. "Park Sungjin. Nice to meet you."

Younghyun introduced himself, hoping to god neither Sungjin nor the people sat near them had read that goddamn article from the Dong-A Ilbo. Fortunately there was no light of recognition on Sungjin's face — a good sign for a potential friendship, that lack of interest in royal affairs — and it was too noisy in here for people to overhear by chance.

It turned out, as well, that they were born almost a year apart, that Sungjin-hyung was very bad at pretending to not care about these things, and that he loved food even more than Younghyun did. Together, they spent a very merry hour demolishing their food and the extra serving of glutinous-rice-flour coated tangsuyuk, which led naturally to a debate about dipping versus pouring.

"I don't think I've met someone who likes eating as much as I do," said Sungjin-hyung, as they walked back to the Tube station, pleasantly full and extremely satisfied. "Or who can eat more than me. Are you some kind of athlete?"

Younghyun thought about the mandatory training sessions with Lt. Choi at the embassy, and how he was expected to keep up a certain level of fitness. This involved, much to his displeasure and the terrible two's complete and utter bafflement, going for dreadful, cold runs on grey, mizzling London mornings and calisthenics in the sitting room.

Jinyoung had once walked in on Younghyun getting some squats in whilst waiting for the oven to preheat, and walked back out. He had come back in again a few seconds later, but only — and he'd emphasised this — because he'd really wanted that yoghurt snack with the crispy chocolate balls in the corner.

"Kind of. My coursemate keeps trying to get me to join the rugby team, even though I keep telling him I have no idea how to play."

"Ah..." Sungjin gave him the nonplussed look of someone who went to Central St. Martin's, which probably didn't have any sports societies.

Younghyun assayed this guess.

Sungjin snorted. "Well, I like football and keep up with the sports news, but... not a lot of time for that stuff."

"My housemate likes football a lot too," said Younghyun. "Seems like arts students don't really get to have lives outside of the arts. He's just practising and rehearsing all the time."

Shrugging, Sungjin tapped his way past the turnstiles. "I play some recreational games with friends, sometimes. Nothing so organised as a league, but ... your housemate's welcome, if he wants."

"I'll let him know — wait, what's your number, hyung?"

So they exchanged contacts, Younghyun feeling some sort of childish vindication at having _made a friend independently_ , ha, _take that Wonpilie_. And then it turned out that Younghyun would have to change for the Jubilee line while Sungjin had a long journey all the way to King's Cross ahead of him.

"It's far, but worth it." Sungjin shrugged.

Very pleased to have found someone who had the same food versus distance priorities as he did, Younghyun grinned and nodded. And so they parted with the promise to go out and eat together again at some time, and Younghyun had to run for the doors.

*

Younghyun had suspected that Sungjin-hyung's all black ensembles were less fashion statement and more broke student, but he really ought not have underestimated the strength of Sungjin's feelings about cut and fit and fold and drape and any other assortment of words being half-bellowed drunkenly at him in the well-hidden noraebang somewhere near Goodge Street.

This many months into Dowoon's presence in London, media moratorium or not, there were inevitably photographs of him floating around. Most of these were the official ones taken at Dowoon's diplomatic obligation events, but some of the others were just of him queueing up for a bacon and brie panini at the union cafe or hunched over his laptop in the Main Library, sitting elbow to elbow with unsuspecting fellow students.

According to the embassy's public relations office, the Corean diaspora in London (and its surrounds, and to a lesser extent further afield) were very excited to have the King in their midst, and it was a novelty of a sorts to spot him go about student life.

At least, Younghyun thought, the better part of Sungjin's sartorial ire was aimed at Dowoon's official dress.

The rest of Lee Seung-gi's _Because I'm Your Guy_ instrumental track played out, forgotten, in the background, as Sungjin dissected the suit that Dowoon had worn to the recent charity fundraiser held by some intensely moneyed Brazilians, in between tossing back shots of soju.

"I mean," Younghyun cut in, feeling that his head was going to start spinning if he had to hear more about weave and twill or whatever the hell Sungjin was complaining about now. He was already feeling a little spatially challenged, as it was. "If you have such strong opinions just tell him yourself, hyung."

This, at least, had the effect of cutting short Sungjin's rant. The pause was accented by the song selection music.

"How?!" Sungjin's habit of talking with his hands got about a hundred times worse when he was drunk; he almost knocked the clear plastic placard advertising the noraebang rental rates over. "It's not like I can just KaTalk him and be like, _hey,_ pyeha _, whoever dresses you should be fired_."

Technically, nobody was really dressing Dowoon at the moment. He'd been sent off to London with a complement of suits and a booklet of guidelines by the Palace stylists, who were currently concentrating their energies on Soojin- _gongju_.

Younghyun knew better than to reveal that sort of detail. But he was kind of drunk, so he took out his phone and unlocked it about two tries in. "I don't see why not. I mean, he doesn't use KaTalk but —"

"I —" whispered Sungjin, eyes very big and shiny when Younghyun showed him his phonescreen . " _What the fuck_?"

*

What with the initial hysterics and Sungjin just _stopping in the middle of eating_ to stare at Younghyun uncomprehendingly, it unsurprisingly had taken no little persuasion (and dossier-investigation) to get Sungjin to come visit at the townhouse.

Apparently, only " _Pyeha_ said he'd like to meet you" worked.

Younghyun left out the part where Dowoon had smiled that warm, awkward half-grimace and said, "Especially since he's the first real friend hyung's made in London."

"Yah —" Younghyun had reached over their embassy-provided _bulgogi-bap_ to prod him "— I'm pretty sure Matt and all of them count as friends."

Sungjin, being very busy with his own course, only managed to squeeze time out on a Wednesday evening, but brought pizzas from the place somewhere in Somers Town that did massive ones. They sat, oozing heat and fat, in the kitchen for dinner later.

He had also brought his portfolio and honest-to-god swatches of cloth, like he was applying for a job or something.

"Um," said Younghyun, when Dowoon made his diplomatically surprised face. "Hyung is very passionate about ... couture?"

"I just think that _pyeha_ deserves better," said Sungjin. "Just look at how this jacket creases in the back! You'd get kicked out of CSM for that."

"Surely not," said Dowoon, who'd leaned forward to examine the offending photograph on Sungjin's phone. "I think the fit was better in Corea, when I had the suit made. I've grown a little, or something."

Sungjin harrumphed.

"It's not like Dowoon can see it, anyway," said Younghyun, tucking his teasing grin into the corner of his mouth.

"BUT EVERYONE ELSE CAN!" bellowed Sungjin, before sitting back in his armchair. "Uh, sorry for shouting, _pyeha_."

"It's all right. And please," said Dowoon, "just call me Dowoon. You're a friend of Younghyun-hyung's."

Sungjin looked briefly hunted, cast a dark look over at Younghyun, before nodding back at Dowoon. "Okay. Sure. Uh, Dowoon ... nim."

They'd moved onto how Sungjin had found his way to London, completely with dramatic reenactments of Sungjin's eomma's sad farewell speech to her beloved son, when the sound of someone banging their shin against the coat/umbrella rack in the vestibule and cursing loudly filtered into the sitting room.

"Oh, hyung's back!" Dowoon turned to look expectantly at the door.

" _Hyung_?" Sungjin hissed in a frantic undertone to Younghyun. "Is that like a you-hyung or more royalty?"

Before Younghyun could reply, Wonpil limped, still rubbing his leg, into view.

He was just getting back from tea with his grandfather (who'd come up to London on some sort of bank business) and was dressed very, very nicely. He had a waistcoat on and had straightened his hair and everything.

"My cousin," said Dowoon, who was in hilarious contrast wearing a hoodie over a t-shirt and those club ripped jeans. Sungjin had given his clothes a look and conspicuously said nothing.

"Hi!" said Wonpil brightly, straightening up. "I'll come say hello properly again once I've got all this off. It's like wearing a corset!"

Unable to help himself, Younghyun teased, "Are you sure that isn't just all the scones?"

" _No_ , you know I don't eat that much."

Younghyun eyed the paper bag Wonpil had dangling from one wrist significantly.

"Oh!" Wonpil glanced down at it. "Of course. Here you go, leftovers galore."

And having deposited the remnants of Claridges tea on the table, he hurried out of the room to go free himself of bespoke couture.

"Your cousin, _pye_ — um, Dowoon-sshi. Your cousin is wearing — he must be able to breathe." Sungjin sounded agonised. "That's bespoke. Anderson and Sheppard, I think? They wouldn't let anyone walk out uncomfortable."

"It's the formality that Wonpilie-hyung finds suffocating, I think."

In an attempt to be helpful, Younghyun added, "It's more metaphorical."

Sungjin continued looking vaguely horrified and gobsmacked rolled into one.

Younghyun offered him a teacake.

"Tell me," said Dowoon in a valiant effort at distraction, "more about how you and Younghyun-hyung met."

Alas, the distraction was short-lived, as Wonpil soon bounded into the room in a large pink jumper that clashed horrifically with his very favourite pair of tartan lounge pants.

"I suppose," said Sungjin after a while, "that it's sort of like ... concept art."

Wonpil nodded at him, mouth twitching; he'd been told about what Sungjin was studying. "It's commentary on like ... contrast. Aesthetics. Class. The transience of something or other. I'm _living_ the performance."

"Marina Abramović would be so proud," Sungjin said drily, which made Wonpil burst out laughing.

Feeling distinctly left out and aware enough to know how ridiculous that was, Younghyun handed Wonpil a mug of hot water with a slice of lemon in.

"Thank you, hyung." Wonpil's smile as he took the mug made Younghyun's stomach do the strange, weightless rollercoaster drop thing again.

Shrugging, Younghyun said, "I thought you'd be sick of tea."

"One can never get tired of tea," Wonpil intoned solemnly. "Though one can certainly imbibe too much caffeine. I don't know how _harabeoji_ does it; he must be at least half tea."

"Sungjin-sshi really likes your suit, hyung," Dowoon interjected. "He said it was, uh, some ... what were those names you said again?"

"Anderson and Sheppard," supplied Sungjin. "They're ... very ... very ..."

"Savile Row, I know." Wonpil laughed airily even as he slid even further down the armchair he was in, legs splayed out. "It's only really for tea with _harabeoji_. I don't even put that on for recitals."

Sometimes, when Wonpil said things like this, Younghyun absolutely understood why Jinyoung had his little implosions over the realisation that Wonpil was related to — _was_ a prince, even though he hadn't been brought up like one. He had a gift for compartmentalisation, did Wonpil.

Sungjin shook his head. "If I had a suit like that ..."

"Why _do_ you have a bespoke suit?" Younghyun asked. It's not like he hadn't seen Wonpil in other ones (or maybe just the one, with different sorts of shirts that Wonpil rotated through) before, when he had official school things to attend.

"Well, um" — Wonpil looked a little sheepish — "There was this...incident."

"An incident," repeated Younghyun, thinking very suddenly of Agent Shim's dressing advice before Dowoon had had dinner with his great-uncle.

It transpired that Wonpil had turned up for tea with his grandpapa in his first year of uni mildly hungover, in a jumper he'd picked up off his chair pile, jeans he'd found on his floor next to his bed, and with oversized sunglasses on. He'd _shaved_ , at least.

"... _daebak_ ," said Dowoon. " _Chakeun-harabeoji_ is really liberal for, you know, his age, but ..."

Wonpil nodded solemnly. "But _this_ —"

Apparently Wonpil's noona had literally put her face into her freshly manicured hands whilst Wonpil had looked beseechingly up at their carefully stoic waiter and asked for coffee.

"...and anyway, that's why I've got two suits," said Wonpil to a room of people who: (a) would've liked to have at least two suits; (b) had more suits than anyone knew what to do with (except the Royal Office of Public Engagement); (c) had more than two suits because of his job. "Because the recital suit wasn't Savile Row enough for _harabeoji_."

"Is it off the rack?" Sungjin asked in the tones of a man who knew he really ought to know better than to ask.

"Marks and Sparks is perfectly respectable!" Wonpil said defensively. " _Eomma_ got it tailored and everything too!"

"Do you have to wear your suit when you visit him?" asked Dowoon with great interest.

"Oh, only when he's putting on a party. And even then, sometimes it's the hanboks."

To wit, what had happened was that Prince Buyeong had imperiously commanded Wonpil to "clear your afternoon tomorrow, grandson; we must rectify your wardrobe."

" _Rectify_ ," Sungjin repeated.

"I've only met him the once," said Younghyun around a mouthful of scone, "but that definitely sounds like Buyeong- _daegun_."

The rest of the evening was largely taken up with exploring Wonpil's hilarious patchy suit knowledge, largely acquired via osmosis.

"I mean," said Wonpil over pizza and wine in the kitchen, "I suppose I can tell what a good suit is, just because I've spent so much time just looking at _harabeoji_ 's. I'm not particularly bothered, though."

"Me either," Dowoon put in, even though he wore silk pyjamas to bed and favoured the linen durumagi-inspired dressing gown that he'd received as an eighteenth birthday present. Jinyoung had once, very early on, thought he was seeing a mirage when he'd run into Dowoon in the kitchen before a morning lecture.

On the other hand, Younghyun had slightly different priorities when it came to the cut and give or whatever of the suits he had to be bundled into on duty, but Sungjin didn't quite need to know about that.

It transpired that Wonpil couldn't tell you the names of any material or cut or style, though he did point uncertainly at a double-breasted suit and say, " _Harabeoji_ had one of those made, once, but _halmeoni_ didn't like how it looked on him."

Dowoon had mostly been spectating the game that they'd made out of showing Wonpil pictures of different suits and getting him to say whether he thought one was good or bad, but at this he nodded. "The Palace tailors say that I'll have to grow a bit more for that sort of jacket."

"Well" — Wonpil nodded at the Ozwald Boateng number (modelled by the man himself) that Sungjin had brought up on Wonpil's laptop, which had been pressed into service for this game — "that one's all right on that bloke, I reckon."

"This," said Sungjin, lifting the last slice of chicken pesto pizza, "is both fascinating, a little bit infuriating, and hilarious."

Younghyun thought privately to himself that this was often the case with Wonpil.

"Can I take you along to fashion week?" Sungjin went on. "It would make the whole experience _so_ much funnier."

"Oh, Christ." Wonpil sipped at his wine, having stopped eating a while ago, before turning to look at Younghyun. "Um, if it were just me I'm sure it'd be fine?"

Younghyun shrugged, having no intention of enlightening Wonpil as to the permanent shadow escort he'd gained in the past few months.

There was a thoughtful look on Sungjin's face as he looked at the two of them, but whatever conclusions he was drawing, he didn't see fit to share.

When the pizzas had been demolished, and Sungjin packed away into an embassy car ("Wow," he'd said, blinking hard) together with a box of leftover pastries from Claridges, Wonpil turned smiling to Younghyun in the vestibule.

Before Younghyun could say something like _See_ , though, Wonpil said, "You've made a nice friend, hyung. I'm glad."

And there was really nothing Younghyun could say to that.

***

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the entirety of year 1 is just an endless take on 'getting to knowwwwww youuuuuuuuu'. anyway pashion bob makes me laugh months later so. i am sorry if it didn't tickle you.
> 
> if you this made you feel a ling or laugh a ... laugh, please drop me a comment down below! kudos if you haven't already! and give this silly thing a boost by [retweeting](https://twitter.com/forochel/status/1289018119055388672).


	8. a new friend, a gastropub, and more banter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> or: meeting Jaebeom

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> JJP fans, this one goes out to you. I trained in the way of JJP for 17 fics in order to write them as a background pairing in all my youngfeel fic. 
> 
> POV switching happens here because that's what happens when you chaotically write all periods in a multi-year timeline at once.

* * *

One March evening when they were all working on final essays and such in the piano parlour, Jinyoung said, "You two haven't been to the Cider Tap yet, have you?"

"Oh," Wonpil said mournfully, "No, Jinyoungie, no. It's much too crowded. Hyung will never say yes."

"Yes to what?" asked Younghyun, but no-one was listening.

"It's all right if we get there early enough in the evening."

"It fills up so fast! _I_ don't like it in there!"

Jinyoung sighed. "I just thought, you know, we could hang out with Jaebeom or something without him having to come down here. He still thinks it's mad I live in SW1."

"He doesn't know a thing about London's postal codes," sniffed Wonpil, lately of Reading.

"Can someone please tell me what we're discussing?" Younghyun cut in.

Dowoon, sensibly, had his headphones on again.

"I thought I'd introduce you to my — to Jaebeom. You know. Wonpil's aways on at you about making friends."

"This is _not_ what I meant," said Wonpil.

"Ah," said Younghyun, understanding now.

Getting that dossier together on Im Jaebeom — born and raised in Ilsan, got an arts scholarship to study music and ethnomusicology at SOAS, apparently the on-and-off-again of his random housemate and Wonpil's mortal enemy for the very same reason, wasn't very political at all — had been prescient, it seemed.

"Well, no objections from me, in principle." A thought occurred to Younghyun. "But what about an embassy event?"

Both Wonpil and Jinyoung turned to him and said, " _No_."

Younghyun sighed and rested his head against the backrest of his chair. "That would make my life so much easier, you know."

"Objecting would have made your life easier," Wonpil said, and played a distinctly aggravated series of arpeggiated scales on the piano.

Sighing again, Younghyun rolled his head to look at Jinyoung. "Just ... give me a list of locations by ... oh, the day after tomorrow, all right?"

"Being friends with you lot," said Jinyoung, "is so fucking weird."

*

But Jinyoungie had got Younghyun-hyung that list after all, which is how they ended up in a tiny pub across a narrow street from an second-hand bookstore and a chippie doing roaring business. The pub was small, dimly lit, and served the kind of clientele who would order biodynamic-hydro-organic buttersquash ravioli and roasts that came with _jus_ and _coulis_.

"Uh," said Jaebeom, after perusing the menu. "Do you think they'd mind if I just pop across the road for some haddock? I'll eat outside."

Despite himself, Wonpil felt a very deep empathy with him.

Dowoon, who looked a little sorry, said, "We're paying, Jaebeom-sshi, please don't fret."

Jaebeom, who — despite having been forewarned by Jinyoung — still looked a little gobsmacked whenever it dawned on him that he was at the same table as the monarch of his own home country, opened his mouth. Closed his mouth. And then glanced around in a comically obvious fashion before whispering, "Is that a royal we or, like, ....?"

Wonpil rolled his eyes. " _I'm_ not paying for your dinner."

"I suppose it is," said Dowoon thoughtfully before Jinyoung could get properly upset, "isn't it?"

This sufficiently stunned Jaebeom into silence, and got him to flip past the appetisers page.

After the bumpy start, though, Dowoon got Jaebeom started on his subject, and then they were off to the races with jazz. Jinyoung was smiling at Jaebeom in full adoration mode while Wonpil alternated between pouting crossly at this tableau and letting Younghyun distract him.

There _had_ been the by-now amusing little byplay of Jaebeom looking deeply confused, and the subsequent realisation of what exactly Younghyun _did_ , when their food arrived and Younghyun had to taste-test everything on Dowoon's plate: from the lamb shank down to the peas drowning in _jus_.

"But what do you think, hyung?" Dowoon said suddenly.

He'd interrupted, right in the middle of the story that they had been making up about the old couple who were having a very tensely quiet dinner next to the fireplace (it had involved time-travelling spies, Pororo, and Shostakovich).

"What?" Wonpil blinked. He had been explaining Shostakovich to Younghyun. "About what?"

"Um, the ... what did you say, Jaebeom-sshi? The orthodoxy of —"

"Oh," said Wonpil shortly. "That stuff. I don't disagree. I do study a bit of film music. Can't be too beholden to the Western classical canon. Also, you know, being Corean."

Younghyun was looking a little amused when Wonpil turned back to him. "Eat your dinner, Wonpil-ah."

Despite Jinyoung's keen gaze, Wonpil couldn't help scrunching his face at Younghyun before returning to his ravioli.

"So, uh," Jaebeom said probably a little too loudly, "Younghyun-sshi? What do you do?" He paused and swallowed. "I mean, what are you reading?"

"Economics," said Younghyun. "With a foreign language."

"Oh. Practical."

"Yes." Younghyun sliced a piece off his duck. "My father thought so."

Jaebeom got the look that people usually did when they realised that Younghyun was a real person with a family.

"Ah, of course. My parents would probably agree." Jaebeom shrugged, and then smiled. "But I got a scholarship, so they couldn't argue."

Younghyun looked up at the corning on the ceiling for a moment in thought, and then back down. "Would you say I got a scholarship, _pye_ — Dowoon-ah?"

"I think you're earning your tuition," Wonpil said wryly.

"I guess that's true." Younghyun nodded at Jaebeom. "It seemed the most rational choice to make."

"Right. Homo...economicus, right?" Jaebeom smiled weakly.

Notwithstanding the fact that Wonpil had only very recently learnt about things like _ceteris paribus_ and the astounding notion that the people running the economy apparently thought human beings were capable of rationality for more than five seconds at best, Wonpil found himself disdainfully surprised that Jaebeom knew enough to crack a joke.

Perhaps Jinyoung had a point. Per _haps_.

In any case, Younghyun — who felt much the same re: rationality — heaved a sigh. "It's all a lie, and they tell you it's a lie, and then proceed to teach you things founded on that lie." Then he shrugged. "But yeah. Homo economicus."

"Everything," said Jinyoung, who was having a Derrida phase, "is just ... made up."

Turning deliberately back to Younghyun, Wonpil said, "Speaking of making things up, where was I?"

"Shostakovich." Younghyun had gone back to looking amused and rapidly denuding his duck leg of flesh. "But Wonpil-ah, are you going to finish the rest of your pasta?"

Sighing in resignation, Wonpil took a long sip of his cider and turned back to the bio-organic hurdy gurdy buttersquash ravioli, or whatever it was called.

"It isn't tasty?"

"No, no." Wonpil scooped one pillowy pocket up. "It is, it's just very filling."

He bit off half the ravioli and chewed on it in Younghyun's general direction. The other half of the table had gone back to cordial chat about jazz and Jaebeom's underground music explorations again.

Younghyun hummed thoughtfully, so low that Wonpil could barely hear it over the ambient chatter and folk music playing in the background.

"Do you want to switch?"

His plate, when Wonpil looked at it, was mostly demolished. There was a tiny heap of duck next to the remaining peas and carrots and what looked like actual chestnuts, glistening in the proverbial _jus_. He looked up at Younghyun, who at least had the grace to look a little embarrassed.

"Just say you're still hungry, hyung," said Wonpil, and pushed his dish over.

The duck was rather superlative, so Wonpil didn't mind very much in the end. He was investigating the mystery of whether these chestnuts-shaped things were actually some sort of mushroom or not when Dowoon cleared his throat and called Younghyun's name.

"Ah — yes?" Younghyun looked up and consciously bit off the _pyeha_ that seemed like a reflex whenever they were in public.

"Hyung, do you mind getting more drinks? We're all running low."

"Were you eating ravioli before?" asked Jaebeom, confused.

Entirely ignoring him, Younghyun got swiftly up. "I don't mind." As he edged around his chair, he touched Wonpil on the shoulder. "Do you want a refill too?"

Wonpil nodded, before reaching over to spear a ravioli for himself.

When he looked up from bisecting and then spooning some of the duck sauce into the ravioli, Jinyoung was giving him a look.

"What?"

Jinyoung opened his mouth, squinted harder, and then closed it.

"All right," said Jaebeom abruptly. "So, no offence, _pyeha_ , but ... why ... does your bodyguard hate me?"

"He doesn't hate you," Dowoon said reasonably.

"Okay, but whenever he looks at me it's like ... I don't know, it's that blank look. It's worse than an angry face."

"Oh, lord. The _blank face_." Jinyoung rolled his eyes and punched Wonpil in the shoulder. "It's because Pilie doesn't like you."

Jaebeom turned to look at Wonpil. "Still?" He looked back at Jinyoung. "Wonpilie isn't like this to all your friends, is he? I've seen him playing around with Jackson."

"I like Jackson! Jackson's nice to Jinyoungie!"

" _I'm_ nice to Jinyoungie! I'm nice to _you_!" Jaebeom started getting visibly frustrated. "I carried that table all the way up that hill for you!"

"Jackson's nice _all the time_. And we didn't ASK you to."

Patting Jaebeom on the arm, Jinyoung said, "I appreciated it, hyung."

Dowoon, who had been spectating quietly, said with a look of innocent confusion that Wonpil _knew_ from the past few months was entirely a smokescreen — "But didn't you say you'd got rather fond of that moth-eaten old thing just the other day, hyung? When housekeeper-nim wanted to throw it out."

Both Jaebeom and Wonpil sputtered — but obviously at quite different parts of Dowoon's question.

"What," demanded Jaebeom when he had taken a restorative sip of beer, "is it that you have against me?"

Wonpil, who had been party to _too_ many grimly weepy sessions about him from Jinyoung and had had to pick Jinyoung up from crying into an illegal beer can whilst sat on the kerb outside his halls one time in first year, sniffed and put his nose up in the air.

"And," continued Jaebeom, "what does this have to do with Younghyun-sshi looking at me like he expects me to commit treason at any moment?"

"Oh," said Jinyoung, who was a traitor and never deserved to dampen Wonpil's shoulder, "it's because he's one giant walking soft spot for Pilie."

In Corean, Dowoon murmured to Wonpil: "Hyung, this is like watching a drama."

Wonpil, too embarrassed to speak and hiding in the remainder of his pint, elbowed him in the side.

Across the booth, Jaebeom contemplated this inconvenient truth as well as the bottom of his pint. "Well, that's unfair."

"What's unfair?" asked Younghyun, who had arrived with a tray of drinks for everyone, except for his responsible water.

"Nothing," Jinyoung said hastily before Jaebeom could demand to know why Younghyun thought he might commit regicide just because Wonpil was a very protective friend.

"Life," intoned Wonpil at the same time, in very ponderous Corean.

Younghyun was silent whilst distributing the drinks and testing Dowoon's, but then he sat down and said, smiling a little, "I don't know, Wonpil-ah, it's not all that bad right now, is it?"

"Didn't you say that you had about five deadlines next week?" Jinyoung looked at him incredulously.

He had, Wonpil remembered. This had been whilst he'd been doing Royal Guard things on his tablet — looking at duty rosters or something equally banal.

Shrugging, Younghyun said, "I've had worse."

" _How_?" asked Jaebeom, deeply aghast.

Younghyun favoured him with an opaque smile. "Wouldn't you like to know."

"Hyung," contributed Dowoon, "was in high school when he started training for ... well. This."

Jaebeom, who had indeed attended high school in Corea, looked even more deeply aghast. "Man, I think I need to buy you a drink. But, like, next time."

To Wonpil's deep displeasure, Younghyun raised his water and said, "Cheers to that."

"Do not," hissed Jinyoung, kicking Wonpil under the table, "ruin it, Pilie."

Wonpil sulked into his fresh pint of cider whilst Younghyun and Jaebeom started reminisicing about their shared Corean public high school trauma. Dowoon had to assure him in an undertone that his own experience had been quite different, and Jinyoung looked increasingly concerned at every word that came out of their mouths, even though they'd switched into Corean about a minute into the first horrifying anecdote.

"Jaebeom-hyung," said Jinyoung suddenly, breaking Wonpil out of the slightly-too-full irritable daze he'd fallen into. "You're talking too fast."

Terribly, Jaebeom just grinned and pet Jinyoung's hand. "I'm helping you practise, Nyoungie," before turning back to some horrendous _hagwon_ tale that he'd been regaling Younghyun with, completely missing the way Jinyoung's mouth twisted a little.

Wonpil suddenly felt 100% vindicated again.

Especially when it clearly hadn't passed _Younghyun_ by, and he switched back into English.

In any case, Wonpil assumed an air of injured martyrdom and bravely bore the rest of this suddenly interminable get together via the application of alcohol and stolen bites of the sticky toffee pudding which Younghyun _somehow_ still had the space for. By his side, Dowoon was content to listen and occasionally remind Younghyun that his _hagwon_ starting from second year of high school had been more combat training and less calculus drills.

"I studied too..." Younghyun protested, injured. "Got into UCL fair and square."

"Seriously —" Jaebeom shook his head "— _two_ beers."

"Okay, but what I haven't worked out yet," said Jinyoung, "is _why_ you had to join the Guards at like ... sixteen. I can't imagine there was a dire lack of candidates."

Wonpil paused mid-sip, and turned a little to look curiously at Younghyun, who'd gone still and Royal Guard blank. When he glanced briefly over, Dowoon had a chagrined little smile on his face as he scraped very undecorously for the dregs of his panna cotta.

"Oh, well," Younghyun said airily after a long enough pause that Jinyoung started looking nervous and Jaebeom _definitely_ did. "You know, it seemed the thing to do. Jaebeom-sshi, what were you saying about your b-boy squad?"

So that was that, Wonpil supposed. If Younghyun didn't want to talk about the _oath_ he'd sworn like some kind of _sageuk_ character when he had been _twelve_ and felt compelled to honour, then they would have to continue being completely bewildered by the strange world their housemates lived in.

Dinner wound to a close once Dowoon started drooping. He really was very cute, Wonpil thought fondly, what with the way he was trying to open his eyes wider and stave off sleep.

Outside the pub, once the bill had been settled and everyone was appropriately be-coated and be-scarved, there was an awkward sort of lull in conversation as Dowoon let out another enormous yawn.

"Sorry," he apologise, hand held over his mouth. "It's just — la-a-ate."

"No, I'm sorry, _pye-_ — uh, Dowoon-sshi." Jaebeom bobbed an abortive bow, and then looked mortified. Dowoon must have told him to drop the title at some point when Wonpil hadn't been paying attention.

"It's not even ten," said Jinyoung drily.

Wonpil nudged him. "Dowoonie's been up late working on things because of that trip he has this weekend."

"Oh, well." Dowoon came as close to shuffling his feet in public as he ever probably would. "We'll just go warm up the car first — hyung?"

"Of course," murmured Younghyun, who'd been observing all of this with that particularly amused little quirk of his mouth.

"It was very nice to meet you, Jaebeom-sshi," said Dowoon solemnly. He probably would've held his hand out to shake if Jinyoung hadn't been holding onto both of Jaebeom's for warmth.

"Ah, yes —" Jaebeom did his little awkward bob again "— uh, you too. Both of you."

Farewells duly exchanged, they went around the corner to where Younghyun had miraculously found parking space.

"Wonpil-ah," said Younghyun, "let's at least try to be happy for Jinyoung that things are going well?"

Dowoon's face was entirely neutral when Wonpil glanced back at him, alone and in the shadows of the backseat.

Thusly outnumbered, Wonpil made a face, pushing his mouth to one side.

"I'll try," he said darkly.

There was a laugh from the back seat and Younghyun looked across at him with dancing eyes. "You're very protective, aren't you?"

"Only of select people," sniffed Wonpil.

"Am I select people, hyung?" asked Dowoon, humour in his voice.

Wonpil twisted around to point at him. "What kind of question is that? Of course you are!" Then he thought about it. "But you don't need me, really, with Younghyun around."

"Oh no," said Younghyun, pulling him gently back around just as Jinyoung appeared. "I think he really does."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> how'd you like that "RABU RABU FOOD SHARING" (bysine, 2020), eh? 
> 
> anyway points (well, points and enthusiastic waving) to anyone who recognised the location of that pub. 
> 
> please drop me a comment down below, [retweet](https://twitter.com/forochel/status/1291926819730599936) etc!


	9. Dinner in Reading

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meet the parents doesn't count if you're working when it's happening.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we return to tkem verse prime at last!!! got massively sidetracked and didn't want to inundate the tag with my fic. anyway, because I too 100% forgot which chapter I was supposed to post and what happened ... 
> 
> _previously on_...
>
>> the gang meet their random housemate's on-again-off-again-on-for-now jaebeom at a ridiculous gastropub somewhere in bloomsbury, there is (in bysine's words) rabu rabu food-sharing, a meeting of true minds (jaebeom and younghyun, much to wonpil's dissatisfaction), and a meaningful if short conversation in a car.
>>
>>> and now, because I am me, More Food.

* * *

One of the biggest pains of being a Corean overseas was the sudden loss of the tiny speciality shops and pojangmacha. The way no-one other than that one ajumma out in Zone 5 seemed to understand that BANCHAN SHOULD BE FREE. Worst of all: the single eyelash on the egg on top of the naengmyeon at some unbearably mod-ish and overpriced place in Holborn.

"You could just eat in the embassy," Wonpil pointed out after Younghyun had in a fit of hangry pique regaled him with a bullet pointed-list of everything wrong with commercially available Corean food in London, and possibly all of the United Kingdom.

"The embassy only does healthy food!" Younghyun clenched his fists and then unclenched them when Wonpil's eyes darted to his hands. "Well, except for Fridays. Tangsuyuk Fridays. Never chicken. Why. Isn't. There. Chicken???"

"Oh, hyung," said Wonpil pityingly, and then the next thing that he knew, Lt. Choi was giving him that gimlet stare at the weekly briefing and asking why Wonpil- _daegam_ had emailed the embassy's general enquiries inbox to ask about arranging for Dowoon to visit his family home in Reading.

"Um," Younghyun said weakly. "I ... expect he didn't know who to contact directly?"

Lieutenant Choi stared harder.

"Maybe it was meant to be a surprise?"

Off the the side, Agent Shim audibly muttered, "Like grandfather, like grandson."

"Come off it, _Buyeong-daegun_ uses his phone just for playing _baduk_ ," Agent Na replied.

Ignoring the peanut gallery, Lieutenant Choi jabbed the marker in his hand at the much-abused whiteboard. "Well, you'll be our direct liaison with _daegam_ moving forward, so at even the _slightest intimation_ of any more plans involving _pyeha_ , let us be prepared."

Later that evening, after Lieutenant Choi had dismissed everyone and gone off to telephone Wonpil's parents and explain to them just why a small party of Royal Guards incognito would be descending upon their home at some undetermined point in the future, Younghyun looked across the car at Sergeant Yoon and muttered, "Sorry for the trouble."

"What for? You don't control Wonpil- _daegam_ 's ... decision-making."

Younghyun heaved a sigh. That, he surely didn't.

"Though you could dissuade him," said Sergeant Yoon, whom it turned out had been deputised to communications when the hapless general enquiry inbox peon had kicked the possible phishing scam over to IT, who'd then kicked it further up the chain to (read: paged for) Lieutenant Choi. "You know, in the future. Wonpil- _daegam_ now has my number and I shudder to think what uses he may put it to."

Younghyun, still feeling chastised even though none of this had been his fault, poked moodily at the dashboard controls. "I don't think he'll bother you a lot, sergeant. He should've just told me."

Sergeant Yoon gave him a sidelong glance. "You weren't wrong when you suggested that it was meant to be a surprise." The car lurched to a start a few seconds after the traffic lights shifted to green. "Though I'm not sure how that kid thought he was going to bundle you and _pyeha_ off to Reading without _you_ noticing."

"I doubt he was thinking that far ahead," said Younghyun, trying to contain the flush of pleasure that had just washed through him at Sergeant Yoon's casual reveal.

"Even after that whole fiasco at — the — what was that place called?"

"Heaven." Younghyun, in retrospect, didn't think that quite qualified as a _fiasco_ , but Sergeant Yoon, who liked listening to classic rock, had strong feelings about the music he had been subject to for hours.

"Hn." Sergeant Yoon turned into the lane on which they lived, along with an assortment of very rich North Europeans, a mysteriously monied Japanese lady who lunched, possibly oil barons from the UAE, and friendly old (and old monied) Imogen. All of whom were mystified by the Corean students who lived amongst them. "Even after that Heaven?"

"That's probably why he emailed," said Younghyun drily. Sergeant Yoon pulled the car to a stop. "But anyway, I'll sort out a date."

*

Easter holidays, Jinyoung had explained, was a time when they were meant to be working on final essays and revising for exams. Of course, he'd told them this, and then proceeded to go on a backpacking trip through Spain and Portugal with some of his coursemates.

"It's a literary trip," he'd said defensively whilst booking last minute train tickets on Renfe, having enlisted Dowoon's translation skills. That Spanish was not amongst Dowoon's languages apparently didn't matter to Jinyoung. "A modern day Grand Tour."

"Were Spain or Portugal ever on the itinerary for a Grand Tour?" asked Wonpil.

Younghyun, who had no idea what a Grand Tour was, thought that if a tour was supposed to be "Grand" surely it should include as many countries as possible, and said so.

The withering look that Jinyoung gave him said that he'd thought wrong, but Wonpil had burst into laughter.

"It kind of makes sense, though, Jinyoungie."

"Yeah, whatever." Jinyoung sighed and started carefully typing in his debit card details. "It's an inclusive, modern day Grand Tour. Sure."

So Jinyoung wasn't in for dinner at Wonpil's parents, but then Wonpil had said, "Oh, ask Sungjin-hyung to tag along! I'm sure he misses home cooking too."

And so what with the complete futility of trying to match up everyone's end-of-term schedules, Younghyun had unilaterally decided that dinner in Reading would be _after_ term had ended.

Except then Younghyun did have group projects to finish working over Easter, and Sungjin had some sort of placement-apprenticeship, and Wonpil was possibly the busiest of them all; he was practising for recitals when he wasn't at some studio assisting a composer who apparently worked a lot with films. And then there were Dowoon's diplomatic obligations, on top of _his_ final essays, which definitely were seeing an uptick in the absence of in-classroom time.

"Well, there is just the bank holiday weekend," said Wonpil. "Surely Dowoonie can't have to be jetting about Europe then?"

"That ... would get you out of that Easter service invitation," said Younghyun to Dowoon. "Family commitments. Can't argue with that."

"They might," said Dowoon, who was pining for home-cooked food that wasn't prepared by the embassy's still rather nervous chef or Younghyun's still inexpert hands, "but we can try."

As it happened, diplomatic visits were just reshuffled so that Dowoon would do his diplomatic visit to Paris later in the week. It was said, later on, in the security grapevine, that the French had been quite relieved to not actually have prepare Notre Dame at Easter of all times for a royal visit.

And so it came to be that Wonpil's impulsive desire to bring Dowoon (and his bodyguard) (and his bodyguard's random eating friend) home to Reading for some good old homecooked food finally came to be realised.

"Are we taking the train too, hyung?" asked Dowoon hopefully, whilst he was finishing an essay the evening before the impending visit.

Wonpil had taken the train out to Reading earlier after a half-day at his internship, citing the parental summons to come home and help out.

The security detail, of course, had already been in and around in the preceding week to do the necessary.

"You know," Wonpil's father had loudly said to him over the phone on Wednesday morning. He had rung to Have Words, apparently, ignoring that his son had almost choked on his roll in his haste to pick up. "This is what I wanted to avoid when I married your mother."

Awkwardly, Younghyun had backed out of the room with his coffee and plate of toast in hand, so that he could only hear the faintest murmurs of Wonpil's protestations as the kitchen door had swung shut behind him.

"No," said Younghyun repressively in the here and now, "we are going to drive down."

Dowoon sighed and went back to his coursework.

On top of the security concerns, of course, were the very same reusable bags that Younghyun had carried up that hill in Kentish Town all those months ago, but now stuffed to the gills with gifts for Wonpil's parents. They contained, based on what what was visible to the eye: small sacks of purple rice, Korean millet, different types of flour, pots of fermented pastes from that nunnery Younghyun could never remember the name of, and concealed under folds of a very soft woven linen _durumagi_ , various feminine products and deep burgundy-red boxes printed with stylised _hanja_ for _sulhwa-soo_.

The ambassador's assistant had told him, whilst handing the bags over, that these things just weren't made the same as in Corea with an envious sigh.

"I'll take your word for it," he had replied and hauled the bags home.

*

It was quite probable that the sleepy row of houses on the edge of Reading that Wonpil's parents lived on had never before seen such a cavalcade of vehicles proceeding down its street. They'd very nearly got lost at a roundabout with about six different exits and very specific lane rules, but then with Wonpil yelling panicked guidance into his ear they'd managed all right in the end.

"There's an even bigger one in Swindon," Wonpil said to them in greeting. He'd been waiting out on the stoop huddled into a light brown, oversized fleece jacket; his hands were tucked into the sleeves. "It's, like, six small roundabouts attached to one enormous one."

Sergeant Ok, who treated driving like a logic quiz and had been the only driver to serenely sail through the earlier roundabout, acquired a look of great interest. Younghyun had a feeling she would be driving out to Swindon on her next day off. Wherever Swindon was.

"Good to know," she said, and then pat Younghyun on the shoulder. "Well. Have fun, Kang. _Pyeha_ , I wish you a pleasant time." She bowed a little, and then jogged back to the car.

"That is too weird," said Sungjin, who was helpfully carrying a bag on either shoulder. "I mean the monster roundabout, not ... not that noona."

"We love our roundabouts." Wonpil shivered as a gust of wind still carrying the last bite of winter whistled past. "Okay, let's get into the warmth —" he turned to fumble the front door open, and then there was the natural back-up in the _hyeongwan_ that had clearly been custom-fit for the house, as everyone set about getting their shoes off and Wonpil tried to gather up all the gift bags and Wonpil's eomma made an appearance down the end of the corridor.

"Ah! You're here!" she cried, clapping in a very Wonpil-like way. She then turned and shouted, "Yah! Kim Junghoon! Your nephew's here!"

"He's your nephew too, darling." A man who could only be Wonpil's father, such a strong resemblance did they bear to each other, emerged from the kitchen behind her, wearing a rather ratty apron that had been sloppily appliqued with fabric cut-outs that read **+1000 HP (소수)** "Hello, hello! Go on into the living room, we'll just be out with the food in a bit. Wonpil-ah, be a good host!"

Younghyun looked at the apron, looked at the profoundly embarrassed look on Wonpil's face, and swiftly took two of the bags that were tilting dangerously in Wonpil's hands away.

"Wow," he heard Sungjin remark softly from behind him.

Dowoon had gone all nervously tense next to him again; Wonpil had clearly noticed the same, because he slipped his arm through the crook of Dowoon's elbow and squeezed his hand comfortingly.

"Come on," he said to them. "Just through that door there."

The living room was just a few feet down from the _hyeongwan_ , a cheerful room with butter-yellow walls and a big sash window that would look out onto the street if the curtains were drawn. Putting the bags down carefully next to a comfortably worn sofa, Younghyun went over to inspect it and found the embassy cars peeling away from the kerb, with the one left behind in the driveway just in case.

"Not much a view," said Wonpil at his elbow, "but it's ours."

Younghyun smiled a little as he turned back around. "They built an apartment block next to our house when I was in middle school, so you've already got a better view than we did."

"Oh." Wonpil made a face. "I hate that."

Shrugging, Younghyun turned to inspect the rest of the room. "It was what it was. There was a nice park behind the block, anyway."

Sungjin and Dowoon had gathered to look at the photographs on the mantelpiece over the fire, and there was an upright piano up against the wall perpendicular to the fireplace. The sofa and two squashy reading chairs had clearly been pushed up flush against the walls to make space for _soban_ tables with beautifully carved feet, as well as traditional flat floor cushions. A clay rice pot already sat atop a pot-holder on the floor at the far end of the tables from Younghyun and Wonpil, close to the piano.

"They went all out," said Wonpil with a trace of embarrassed pride in his voice, when Younghyun couldn't help the noise of admiration he made at the high polished sheen of the dark wood. "And also they made me polish those first thing I got here yesterday."

Younghyun laughed again and shook his head. "Well, I appreciate your efforts, Wonpil-ah."

He didn't get to hear what Wonpil had to say to accompany the way he went pink, because Wonpil's parents swept in then. They were carrying trays bearing more dishes of banchan than Younghyun had ever seen outside of Palace feasts. His own mother didn't make that much as a matter of course, with only the three of them eating.

" _Daebak_ ," said he and Sungjin in perfect tandem.

"Ah, Eomonim, let me help you!" Younghyun exclaimed, and hurried forward, skidding to his knees to help with the unloading of dishes. Sungjin joined him, hands moving fast and sure as any self-respecting tailor's to set out the dishes.

"What helpful boys you've made friends with, Wonpilie." Wonpil's mother (Kim Hyeyi, Hilary; student counsellor at the University of Reading; had been an activist; always voted Green; hilariously anti-monarchy) — pat Younghyun on the arm. "And you are?"

"Oh!" Suddenly realising how rude they'd been, everyone hurried to introduce themselves with all the attendant hand-shaking and bowing that required. Dowoon added on several apologies about causing so much trouble that had Wonpil's parents cooing over him in a way that made it very clear where Wonpil got it from.

"I don't think anyone's greeted me like that in years," said Auntie Hyeyi with some amusement, when everyone had shuffled back to their seats.

"Well, if you'd come along to the community centre," Wonpil's father, who'd quite happily sat back and let Sungjin take over, said to her before turning to look at them all. "I help with new immigrants from Corea, you see, introducing them to English culture and helping them get used to things. English classes and things."

"I'm not driving out to New Malden every other Saturday, thank you."

"That's very kind of you, _samchon_ ," said Dowoon. "When did you start?"

Behind Younghyun, Wonpil let out a tiny sigh of relief when his father launched into a long explanation, distracted from what was clearly a long-standing point of contention.

"My parents have arguments like that too," Younghyun told him sympathetically.

Sungjin, whom by pure dint of being right next to Jung-hoon- _daegam_ (and who preferred not to be called that, Younghyun had to remember), was stuck listening to what sounded increasingly like a recruitment speech and looking increasingly beleaguered.

"Ah, _Eomonim_ , I was wondering" — Younghyun turned to take the last dish from her and put it on the _soban_ farthest away from her — "these tables are really nice. Can you get them here?"

"Oh, no," she laughed. "They're from Corea ... we usually take them out only for special occasions. They are very elegant, aren't they? My parents brought some over too, but they weren't like these."

Running a hand over the lacquered wood, Younghyun nodded. "They're lovely."

" _And_ they fold too!" Uncle Jung-hoon chimed in, demonstrating with one leg whilst carefully holding the top and its assorted banchan dishes up. Sungjin, alarmed, also had two hands holding the _soban_ steady. "Brilliant. Got them as a wedding present. From Hyeyi's uncle and aunt."

"They're carpenters," explained Wonpil. "Wouldn't the shipping have cost more than the tables themselves did to make though, _appa_?"

"Oh, well, they fold, don't they." Satisfied by the appropriately amazed sounds that his guests had made, Uncle Jung-hoon leaned back on his hands. "So they just packed them into a box as oversized luggage and called it a day."

It was at this point that either Sungjin's or Younghyun's stomach growled, but they both looked embarrassed enough that the culprit didn't really matter.

"But that's enough nonsense about furniture and things," said Uncle Jung-hoon in a way that reminded Younghyun really strongly of Prince Buyeong, and uncovered the rice pot. "Let's eat!"

"Oh — " Auntie Hyeyi got abruptly to her feet. "Almost forgot about everything else — Wonpilie, serve the rice while we get the other dishes, please."

"And just start eating," added Uncle Jung-hoon. "Seriously, don't starve on our account."

"I'll do it," said Sungjin, when Wonpil's parents had left and Wonpil was kneeing over to his side of the table. "Just sit there or you'll give us all smaller servings than we want."

"I'm not that bad," mumbled Wonpil grumpily, and reached out with his chopsticks to peel a few leaves of perilla kimchi for himself.

He sort of was, but Younghyun just reminded Sungjin to give him a really compact bowl of rice.

Wonpil's parents returned with grilled fish of some sort and a dish of glistening, fragrant, stickily red —

"Chicken!" Younghyun exclaimed.

"Now," smiled Auntie Hyeyi, "Wonpilie mentioned that you were missing chicken, so I've made _kkanpunggi_."

Between this and Sergeant Yoon's information about Wonpil having wanted this to be a surprise _for him_ (and Dowoon), Younghyun had no idea what his face was doing, only that Dowoon was giving him a look of open fascination.

"We were trying to decide between that and dakgalbi," added Uncle Junghoon, "but then Wonpilie said it was specifically fried chicken you wanted."

"Though maybe Wonpilie also just wanted fried chicken." Auntie Hyeyi looked sternly over at him.

"I helped," said Wonpil in a very small voice. "So I should get a say too."

"You helped?" asked Younghyun, thinking about the kitchen fire of yesteryear.

Wonpil, who'd clearly had the same thought, widened his eyes meaningfully at Younghyun.

"Of course he did!" Auntie Hyeyi was very strident about this. "No child of mine will go without the basics."

"Ah ..." Dowoon, who had run into the kitchen at all the shrieking at the very moment Younghyun had just dropped the pot lid over the mini-fire, squinted. "Well, hyung taught me how to fry an egg. And make ramyeon on the stove."

"The basics," said Wonpil firmly, nodding hard.

"Well," said Wonpil's father with such absent-minded jocularity that he really did strongly resemble his father Prince Buyeong in that moment, "wait 'til I show you how to make my bacon sarnie."

Wonpil sagged. " _Appa_ , _no_."

"I love bacon," put in Sungjin, who'd been eating quietly with his eyebrows quirked the whole while.

"Excellent!" declared Uncle Junghoon. "Now — oh good, you're already eating. Wonpilie, can you go get the soup from the stove?"

"Be careful," added Auntie Hyeyi, "it's heavy."

Soup enough for seven people would be, Younghyun thought, and hurriedly got to his feet.

"I'll help, just in case —" he hurried after Wonpil, and heard Auntie's " _Omo_ " faintly behind.

In the kitchen he found Wonpil staring blankly at the kitchen range, upon which sat a truly enormous earthenware pot that _had_ to have been imported from home.

Younghyun nudged him aside and touched the handles on the pot cautiously. He looked around for some oven mitts. "Are you having regrets?"

Stirring, Wonpil shook his head. "Regrets? No. Just tired. Been helping out with chores since yesterday."

"Well" — having located the mitts, Younghyun shoved them on — "I'll do the carrying, then. Can you hold the door open for me?"

"Mm." Wonpil picked up a water jug, presumably so he wouldn't be accused of slacking off, and went to prop the kitchen door open. "We changed all the curtains yesterday, and then I had to help dad fix some tiles on the garden shed."

The breath that Younghyun blew out as he hefted the soup pot had as much to do with the weight of it as the reminder yet again that Wonpil had grown up with a (mostly) normal home life. "That does sound tiring."

"And then today it was just cleaning everything and endless cooking and washing up," sighed Wonpil, tapping his heel idly against the door as Younghyun took slow, careful, even steps. " _Eomma_ doesn't bother cooking this much when it's just me."

"Well," Younghyun pointed out, trying not to smile, "it _is_ Dowoonie that you invited. Even if he weren't the King, he's still her nephew."

"I s'upose," Wonpil conceded poutily, letting the door swing shut behind them as they proceeded down the corridor into the living room. "And you needn't have sounded so surprised I helped with the food, hyung."

Younghyun barked out a laugh. "I'm sorry, Pilie, it's just —"

"I helped with _chopping_ and mixing sauces and things," continued Wonpil grumpily, "thought that's also because _appa_ can't be trusted around sauce."

"Why is that?"

Sighing tragically, Wonpil said, "He'll put HP sauce into everything if you don't keep an eye on him."

Having previously encountered HP sauce chiefly at chippies and the pub, Younghyun said, "Ah..."

" _HP sauce in doenjang jjigae, hyung_."

A little enlightened, Younghyun said, " _Ah._ Wait, is that why the apron?"

Wonpil's ears went a little pink again as he nodded.

"What took you so long?" asked Auntie Hyeyi when they got back to the living room. "And why are you making our guest carry things?"

Wonpil spluttered. "I didn't MAKE him."

"I volunteered, _Eomonim_ ," said Younghyun, carefully kneeling down with the pot in his hands and set it down on the waiting cork potholder.

"Is that _seollongtang_?" Sungjin leant disbelievingly forward to waft the scent towards himself.

"Yes," said Uncle Junghoon proudly. "My speciality."

With Wonpil's HP sauce warning fresh in his mind, Younghyun gave the pot a dubious look even as he took the lid off. But the broth looked silkily milky as it ought to, with not a hint of having been doctored.

"We kept a really close eye on him," whispered Wonpil.

"I can't wait to try this, _Abeonim_ ," Younghyun said with all the sincerity he could contain. "Truly."

"Me neither," said Sungjin with a fervence that had Uncle Jung-hoon thumping him approvingly on the back.

Slurping, the gentle clink of chopsticks against metal and incomprehensible noises of satisfaction followed for the next while, as everyone applied themselves industriously to their meal. Younghyun looked up at one point from biting blissfully itno a chunk of chicken to see Wonpil's parents surveying them with a proud satisfaction that made him feel, momentarily, homesick for his own parents.

It was at this point, of course, that Auntie Hyeyi commented quietly to her husband, "It's nice to have see young people eat so well."

Dipping his grilled mackerel into the puddle of HP sauce he'd squirted onto his plate, Uncle Junghoon nodded around a mouthful of spinach _muchim_ and swallowed hard. "Especially this one, Sungjin and ... ah, Younghyun." He paused. "You eat well too, of course, Dowoon-ah. Glad to see it."

When Younghyun glanced sidelong, he found Wonpil looking a little exasperated even as he chewed slowly on whatever he'd just taken a bite of. There was just something about the way Wonpil ate that was very — Younghyun shook his head minutely and turned his attention back to his own plate. He couldn't put his finger on it.

"Well, I expect that's why Younghyun looks so healthy and strong," said Auntie Hyeyi.

Startled, Younghyun looked up. "I mean..." he started, feeling that the comparison was rather unfair when Wonpil's job was making beautiful sounds come out of a piano and his was physically defending the King of Corea.

But Auntie was already glancing meaningfully at Wonpil, who was still working away at his first bowl of rice, whereas Younghyun had moved onto hoovering up the _gungjung-tteokbokki_. Younghyun wondered, to his private amusement, if making this royal court special had been offensive to Auntie Hyeri's anti-monarchical views.

"I fixed those roof tiles," said Wonpil mutinously.

"Yes, love," his mother agreed, "and I was afraid you'd be blown off the roof the whole time. Are you still not feeding yourself in London?"

Down the table, Sungjin seemed to be attempting to become one with his food.

"I am!" Wonpil sat up straight, squaring his shoulders and pouting angrily. "Hyung, tell her I eat well!"

Caught, unwilling, between Wonpil and his mother, Younghyun said, "Uh. Wonpilie eats well, _Eomonim_. Really. At least whenever he's eating at home with us," he added in the spirit of honesty.

Wonpil was apparently wound up enough to hit him on the arm.

"I eat regularly, I will have you know," Wonpil said primly, and then went back to wrapping himself a perilla leaf ssam.

"This soup," said Dowoon rather hopelessly, "is really tasty, _samchon_."

*

They did end up sleeping over that night — which was fine, because that had been built into their security plans — and woke up the next morning to a spread of leftovers and Uncle Jung-hoon's threatened bacon sarnies.

"It's the only way to have them," he declared, pushing chopped kimchi around a pan greased with bacon fat. The bacon rashers themselves were waiting atop some kitchen roll. He was wearing that apron again.

"Your apron, _samchon_ ," Dowoon started, and then paused. "Um."

"Oh!" Uncle Jung-hoon lookekd down at it, and then smiled over at Wonpil. "A father's day present from my lovely son."

"Right ... "

Emerging from his mug of coffee, Sungjin fixed Wonpil with a beady look. "Wonpilie. You spelt _so-seu_ wrong."

"What?!" Wonpil squawked, almost dropping the cabbage leaf he'd picked up to make himself a breakfast wrap. "But — but — _eomma_!" He turned to her, anguished.

"Oh," said Auntie Hyeyi, "you and your noona were so delighted, I didn't have the heart —"

"--so I've just been, what, labouring under this delusion for my WHOLE LIFE?"

"I treasure it very much," said Wonpil's father, patting his belly fondly. "Now, who wants a bacon sarnie?"

Underneath the mild chaos that arose as Sungjin volunteered himself and Dowoon did too out of some sense of familial loyalty, Younghyun said in an undertone to Wonpil — "Don't worry, Wonpil-ah, it's a very cute apron."

"Well," grumped Wonpil, though he did look a little mollified, "if you say so."

"I'm very glad that you made friends with our Wonpilie," said Auntie Hyeyi, who'd been drinking her tea at the table and staying well out of the way of the bacon shenanigans. Younghyun felt rather ilke quailing before that gleam in her eye. "The both of you, otherwise you'd be so lonely, wouldn't you?"

"Dowoonie's made friends," Wonpil said, cabbage leaf still forgotten in his hand. "There's Iseult from your course, isn't there? And that drummer from jazz soc."

"And Sungjin-hyung," added Dowoon around a mouthful of sandwich, though Sungjin was now so busy discussing fish sauces from around the world with Wonpil's father that he probably wasn't listening.

Then Younghyun had to explain to Auntie Hyeyi how they had all met and become friends, whilst Wonpil's mouth was too full to editorialise, and somewhere in between all of that a bacon sandwich slid onto his plate.

" — and Sungjin-hyung didn't expect Wonpil to know so much about suits, so then — oh," he said, startled. "Uh, thank you, _abeonim_."

"I thought you looked like you could do with more food," said Wonpil's father, and pat him on the shoulder. Which was objectively true; Younghyun had cleared his plate in massive bites whilst Auntie Hyeyi keenly asked follow-up questions.

"He always could," said Wonpil, who was methodically eating his way through the leftover rolled eggs. "Hyung is a bottomless pit."

"It's because he exercises a lot," contributed Dowoon, before Younghyun could formulate a response. "Though he has to."

Wonpil sighed and rested his face against a palm. "Just looking at him makes me feel tired sometimes."

"And why do you _have_ to exercise so very much?" asked Auntie Hyeyi.

There was a general pause as everyone reassessed. Dowoon shifted awkwardly.

"I — um —" Younghyun put his sandwich down. "I'm a Royal Guard, _eomonim_."

He watched as Wonpil's parents opened their mouths, and then exchanged looks, before Auntie Hyeyi closed her mouth and gestured at her husband.

"My father mentioned you," said Uncle Jung-hoon, "though not by name. We just hadn't thought ... well." He was quietly solemn for a bit, and in that moment genuinely looked like the accountant that he was, rather than an eccentric uncle in the very mould of his father. Then he looked up, eyes creasing. "Would you like another sandwich?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> finally, some Adult Perspective on younghyun's deeply weird work-study programme.
> 
> alsowik: omnomnom. 
> 
> alsoalsowik: inventing wonpil's parents was a fucking DELIGHT. the idea of auntie hyeyi just harbouring LATENT ANARCHISM in her bosom whilst married to a literal PRINCE who's just this eccentric accountant guy who's very passionate about HP sauce and spreadsheets. if you're wondering where wonpilie's noona is ... she will appear in Year 2, which is currently underway again now that I have knocked out the high school AU and the wonpil variations fic. (and ...another fic to be posted sometime this weekend.)
> 
> ok that's enough of me rambling about the icebergian details that endlessly delight me wrt this multiverse. if you laughed or felt hungry or a food craving, please leave me a COMMENT! and [RETWEET](https://twitter.com/forochel/status/1299510034456510464?s=20)! THANK YOU.


	10. Leave-takings I

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> younghyun & dowoon's first year in london winds down to an end

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I barely remember what happens in this chapter because I wrote it ... months ago. bUT WONPIL IS TIPSY somewhere in this and I would like to thank maxim-hyung for bringing a chateau mouton to the show and revealing tipsy pilie for real.

* * *

The rest of the holidays flew by after the weekend in Reading, as did exam term.

It had been unexpected: all this time to revise for exams without any _teaching_.

Younghyun couldn't help but feel that the Corean crown had been cheated of its money, somehow.

"That's why it's called _reading_ for a degree," explained Jinyoung with exaggerated patience as he sat on the floor in the piano parlour, surrounded by stacks of books and printed-out articles. "Because you're meant to _read_ on your own."

So: Summer term raced by a little bit like a hallucinatory dream, punctuated only by Wonpil's scattered birthday celebrations. One day it was April and the next it was early June. The flowers were blooming, the plane trees growing out of the pavement had burst into full green, and on a few special days it had been blue skies and too many half-naked Westerners lounging around in what seemed every single garden square in Central London.

One one of these beautiful days, they managed a picnic in a corner of St James's Park with Sungjin-hyung, who was cool in billowing beige linen and sunglasses. His hair had, by this point, grown out long enough to be tied into a bun. Younghyun was fairly certain he kept it long to save money on getting a haircut rather than reasons of style, but Sungjin remained tight-lipped.

The picnic hamper had come from the embassy's kitchens, but Sungjin provided the strawberries and lemonade whilst Jinyoung and Wonpil had returned triumphantly from the nearest Sainsbury's with a bottle of Pimms the evening before, calling it _a summer classic_ and _necessary for picnics_ and Jinyoung's favourite phrase: _culturally significant_.

"I'm not sure Dowoon should be photographed drinking in public," Younghyun had said, thinking of the very politely restrained email from the Palace's Press Office he had received after the unexpected visit to _Heaven_.

"This barely counts as a _drink_ ," Wonpil had scoffed, "and we'll mix it all up in a pitcher ahead of time."

In the end, Wonpil and Jinyoung ended up the only ones getting a little _too_ tipsy off what Younghyun suspected must be double-strength brew, and had rolled about in the grass giggling and getting quite tanned.

"Is this part of the cultural experience also?" he asked drily when Wonpil almost rolled into the salad bowl and he'd had to catch him.

Solemnly, Wonpil told him, "Being drunk is a British cultural experience." But his eyes, as he looked up into Younghyun's face, danced merrily.

Not entirely sober himself, Younghyun poked him in the cheek and rolled him away.

When he looked up, Sungjin had an eyebrow raised.

"What?" he asked rebelliously.

Sungjin shook his head — was that a smirk tucked into the corner of his mouth? But he only said, "Nothing. Can you pass the japchae?"

*

Younghyun had thought, all those months ago, that he would be very relieved to return to Corea: familiar terrain, familiar faces, familiar sounds.

But now, after this strange year so full of unexpected twists and turns, he found himself swallowing down a strange curling in his chest as they prepared to say their goodbyes for the summer.

"This is going to be so very strange," said Wonpil as he sat on Dowoon's floor and watched Younghyun patiently refold Dowoon's attempts at packing whilst Dowoon tried swatting him away. "I feel I've got so used to having you around. And this place is really too big for one person."

Jinyoung had gone home a few days earlier to spend some time with his own parents before going up to Edinburgh, where he'd be working at the Festival. So that was Wonpil left all by himself in the house for two months — he'd been invited back to continue working with the composer he'd interned with over Easter holidays, and had agreed to play piano accompaniment for a friend-of-a-friend's performance at the Camden Fringe at the end of August.

Their lives, Younghyun felt, only really intersected in this house. It seemed to him, sometimes, like he was looking through a gauze curtain, when Wonpil and Jinyoung talked about their plans and dreams and hopes for the future. And he only sometimes got to step through to their strange, vibrant world populated with colour and music and people throwing themselves dramatically off ladders for the sake of Art, when invited in.

"Well," said Younghyun awkwardly, "just remember that if you need a ride the embassy's cars are there for you."

Wonpil huffed with something like laughter. "Hyung, I'm not going to turn into my _harabeoji_."

"From what I hear," said Dowoon, " _chakeun-harabeoji_ doesn't ever get a car unless they catch him at Victoria."

"So definitely don't turn into Buyeong- _daegun_." Younghyun zipped up one side of Dowoon's suitcase. "And definitely don't set the kitchen on fire."

"Yah! Hyung!" Wonpil slapped him on the arm in protest. Ever since Reading, he'd started doing that whenever he was even mildly annoyed, or laughing, or — whatever. It mystified. "That happened _once_."

"Once was more than enough."

Wonpil just sighed. "I'll be fine. You'll both be fine. We'll skype, or video call, or whatever it is you use."

"I'd like that," said Dowoon. "I'd like to hear about your internship, and also ... and everything."

"Well, I'd like to hear about what _you'll_ be up to as well, even if it's just kissing babies and, I don't know, planting trees."

Dowoon looked mildly terrified at the prospect of kissing babies.

"They'll definitely want to be squeezing as much as they can out of Dowoonie over the summer."

"And you too." Wonpil gave him a long look. "Do remember to take a day off."

Younghyun shrugged. "I'll take one off when _pyeha_ gets to."

Wonpil sighed, then, lying down on the floor and folding his hands atop his navel. "Well, do your best."

*

Wonpil gave Dowoon a sleepy, hard hug in the vestibule, having woken up at the crack of dawn to see them off. He was still in his pyjamas, a large t-shirt and thin cotton shorts in deference to the heat.

"I'll send you a birthday present," he mumbled sleepily but firmly. "Won't forget."

Dowoon clung back a little. Younghyun thought ruefully to himself, as he stood by the door with the luggage cases lined up in a train next to him, that this year had possibly yielded the most hugs Dowoon had ever received in ... well, in a very long time.

Then Dowoon let Wonpil go, and Younghyun came back to himself abruptly when Wonpil turned to him and paused very briefly. Then Wonpil held his arms out with a hopeful smile.

What could Younghyun do, really, but go to him.

It was only because he was folding Wonpil close — carefully, because knowing that Wonpil was slight was one thing and feeling it was quite another — that he heard Wonpil's little inhale and the involuntary _oh_ of surprise, before Wonpil's arms wrapped around him too. And wasn't that just the most Wonpilian of things, to hope without much expectation and give it a go anyway.

"See you in September," he said quietly into Wonpil's ear. And then, instead of what he _really_ wanted to say, added, "Tell me what you're getting Dowoonie and I'll go halfsies with you."

There was a pause, and then Wonpil pat his back lightly and nodded, nose brushing against his collarbone.

When they drew apart, Wonpil was giving him a pleased sort of smile that made Younghyun want to pull him in again. Instead, Younghyun looked at his phone, which was buzzing.

"Ah — we have to go, the car's here."

Dowoon bobbed up from the floor; in a display of his royal grasp on diplomacy and possibly also tact, he had ducked down to do his laces.

"Safe travels," said Wonpil as he leaned against the door jamb, once they were all out the door and the luggage was all loaded. "Text me or — something, when you're home safe."

"You too, hyung," Dowoon said nonsensically — evidently not fully awake yet — and darted in for one last hug before he turned and made his way down the steps. Trying not to laugh, Younghyun waved at Wonpil as he followed.

"Well," he said in the car to Dowoon, who was twisted around to look at the lone figure standing at the door in bunny slippers and waving, "that was a year."

Dowoon glanced at him and smiled. "Did you like it, hyung?"

The car turned out of the lane, and Younghyun reached across the back to pull Dowoon back down while he thought.

"Yeah," he said. "I — yeah."

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> c'est la ... fin? sorry maxim hyung je ne parle pas francais, for real. I'm working on year 2 now and when that's done ............ we'll see what I do with the other like idk 40k or whatever of what I have for the rest of this. je suis tired. 
> 
> to whoever is still reading along, thanks for staying with this vastly self-indulgent thing! and always always to bysine, writing buddy extraordinaire! 
> 
> let me know your feels/thoughts below, and [retweet](https://twitter.com/forochel/status/1302074995322032129?s=20) please!


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